Sharks head coach John Plumtree said the situation looks similar to his first season in charge, where the Sharks finished 14th, but it feels different.
While Sharks head coach John Plumtree admitted he is feeling the pressure of a dismal start to the season, “everyone is working as hard as possible” to get the team back on winning ways.
Plumtree named 13 Springboks in his starting XV and two on the bench to face Scarlets at Kings Park on Saturday (kick-off 4pm) after his similarly-strengthed team lost 34-26 to Ulster at the Sharks Tank last week, their fourth match in a row without a win.
The Durban side find themselves 14th on the United Rugby Championship log – the same place they finished in Plumtree’s first season, 2023/24.
Scarlets are also in dire straits, having lost all three of their matches, with one postponed. They are bottom of the table.
Sharks do some soul-searching
The Sharks have a 3-1 win against the Welsh side, including victories in their last two games.
A win will be crucial before they head into a month-long break, and several Springboks may be out of action, or requiring a break of their own, when the Sharks return against Connacht on 29 November.
Eben Etzebeth will captain the Sharks this week, taking over from Vincent Tshituka after the latter stepped in while Etzebeth was playing for the Boks and missed Sharks training while his wife was due.
Plumtree said his team had learned from their Ulster loss about not preparing as well as they could have, which the coach took responsibility for.
“Everyone’s looked in the mirror and asked where they could be better, what we need to do to prepare for Scarlets,” Plumtree said.
“I’ve looked at myself and the way the team could have managed those two days of preparation better, what I could have done more and less.”
He said sometimes everyone works as hard as possible but the results still do not show. In those times, the Sharks do not throw their processes out. Instead, “we all go to work and ask for more effort, more fight”.
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Plumtree says Sharks have come a long way
When asked if he felt a sense of déjà vu compared to his first season in Durban, he said it looks the same on the table, but it doesn’t feel the same.
“I feel like we’ve come a long way in other parts of the business. When the squad is all fit, we’ve got the best squad that we’ve ever had, and it can win rugby matches.
“Does it put me under pressure? Of course it does… There is a feeling for me that I can’t control everything.
“I can’t control injuries, the fact that we had an early tour, and the fact that we have limited preparation going into the game against Ulster.”
What he can control is what is done in training. And he said he’s rectified that.
