Super Rugby: The mind games for the final start

If the Crusaders are to win their record eighth Super Rugby title – and their first since 2008 – then winning it in Johannesburg would be the ideal challenge, coach Scott Robertson said, because he considers the Lions to be “the real deal”.

“I picked the Lions. I thought they were going to get up. They have enough athletes, they have a good scrum and lineout. They play with no fear so they are the real deal.

“It would have been extremely nice to have a crack at them during the year, but we learnt a lot from how the Hurricanes played. It was a good lead-in for us for how we could play them tactically. We have to take the lessons from what the Hurricanes did and not make the same errors they did,” Robertson said.

The Crusaders arrived in South Africa on Sunday night to take on the Lions in the Super Rugby final at Ellis Park and will be the first team in the competition’s history to cross the Indian Ocean and claim the title should they beat the home side.

“This is as good as it gets. This is a great opportunity for us to come here and get the job done against an extremely good Lions team that is riding a pretty big wave at the moment,” the former All Black flank said on arrival in Johannesburg.

“It’s a tough place to come but we love the challenge.”

This is the second successive year that the Crusaders have travelled to Ellis Park for a knockout game, having lost 25-42 to the Lions in last year’s quarterfinals.

The All Black-laden Crusaders do have two injury concerns to sort out this week, both potentially threatening the participation of two key players in captain and eighthman Kieran Read and tighthead prop Owen Franks.

Read tweaked his knee in the enormous defensive effort required to beat the Chiefs in last weekend’s semi-final, while Franks has injured his achilles tendon.

“We have a full week to prepare as we normally would. The biggest thing for us is recovery. We need to make sure we get everything right. We will have a spike in training intensity on Thursday to get used to breathing hard with the light air here. We just want to cruise into the game and get our mindset right,” Robertson said.

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