OPINION: Playing in the URC is a big juggling act

You have got to feel for the Sharks in particular, and their coach John Plumtree, but also all the teams playing in the United Rugby Championship.

The stop-start nature of the competition makes life extremely difficult for the teams, and at the end of it all, the outfit that wins the title would probably have dealt best with the interruptions throughout their campaign. Because, let’s be honest, there are a lot.

For two weekends now Plumtree has been able to pick his strongest Sharks team, with a bunch of Springbok players in the mix, and they’ve knocked over two former championship-winning sides, Glasgow Warriors and Munster. And they’ve looked like a really formidable unit.

The Bok players, fresh off winning the Rugby Championship and having had some time off to recharge the batteries afterwards, have led the charge.

Disruptions

But now the URC comes to a grinding halt for a month so that Test matches can be hosted in Europe during November.

This disrupts continuity, momentum, rhythm and all sorts of other things that a team needs to be successful.

And then, in the Sharks’ case, when the competition resumes at the end of November, several of their Springbok players will probably be forced to rest, disrupting the team further. The Bulls, too, are impacted by this, as are the Stormers to a lesser extent, but the Lions not so much.

But that’s not all; teams also have to deal with the Champions Cup and Challenge Cup competitions with fixtures coming at times in the URC season that may not suit teams or be beneficial.

And then there are the actual rugby challenges of the URC, playing in the wet northern hemisphere one week, and the hot southern hemisphere the next, while the different styles of the teams from all the different countries poses another challenge.

It’s no surprise Plumtree said at the weekend: “I think everyone needs to cut us a little bit of slack. The reality is that we’re not going to be a full-strength Sharks side all the time.”

Indeed, with the Bok players being available and then not, being ask to rest, and coaches having to juggle more than one competition during the season, it’s hard to win all the time or be consistent.