I can honestly say that we as the coaching staff tried to impress upon the players beforehand that victory was not the most important thing in this first game. In this competition you can get lucky and win here and there, but if you don't start to consistently produce quality high-class performances, then you go nowhere.
There were some very pleasing performances from the new guys. Some confirmed they might have what it takes, others did not. That is what warm-up games are for. You only really know how good a guy is when you test him in a genuine match situation.
Against Free State we did all the playing, but we did not play correctly. If we play correctly against Western Province, the win will take care of itself. We really do have an exciting side. We are very much looking forward to rectifying matters after last week's little hiccup.
Jake and I chatted at length and a compromise has been reached. We have agreed to carefully manage the players (in other words, they will not be run into the ground) and in return there will be no prejudice against them when Jake selects his squad for the end-of-year tour.
We are looking at increasing our depth with a few experienced players.
He's in the mould of (retired Blue Bulls No 8) Anton Leonard.
Our likely team will also not be revealed when we play the Cats the following Wednesday in our final warm-up. Obviously we are going to have a few surprises and we would like to keep those to ourselves.
We obviously didn't finish where we would have liked to in the Currie Cup, but we can take lessons out of the season. Maybe in some ways it was good that we were knocked out early, because we don't have a false sense of where we are.
I think continuity has been a problem in selection and our cohesion and confidence has suffered.
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