‘Hope’ springs eternal for Jake White as lessons of loss can turn Bulls into URC winners

Losing hurts.

Just ask the Bulls team, who lost their dear teammate Cornal Hendricks last week to a heart attack.

Before that, the Pretoria side lost to Edinburgh in the Challenge Cup quarter-finals.

And lest we forget, Jake White’s team have gone down in two United Rugby Championship finals as well – with the second one just last season at Loftus Versfeld.

But there have been a number of famous victories during White’s tenure in the capital city.

Leinster away in a 2022 Dublin semi-final was arguably the finest, and just last month, they knocked over Munster in Limerick and defending champions Glasgow at Scotstoun Stadium.

And just over a week ago, they thrashed the Dragons 55-15.

So, that hard edge is growing in this Bulls team day by day, week by week, month by month, game by game.

They’ve enjoyed another fine URC season, finishing second on the log to earn a home quarter-final and hopefully a home semi-final next weekend too.

But it’s knockout rugby for the next three weeks, and it all starts in Saturday’s last-eight clash against Edinburgh in Pretoria (1.30pm kick-off) – the same Scottish club that booted them out of the Challenge Cup in the same round on April 12.

White, though, is confident that his Bulls team have heeded the lessons from all of that heartache and pain – on and off the field – to bring home the trophy in 2025.

“Edinburgh beat us a couple of weeks ago, so it’s not much I need to say because I think the players understand, we play Sharks next week or Munster if we win obviously, and I’m just saying those were two teams that beat us this year,” White told the media at Loftus on Tuesday.

“Sharks and Edinburgh have beaten us. So, there’s not much that I need to say in terms of getting them ready.”

Last season’s title decider defeat to Glasgow will be remembered in this phase of the season, but so too former Bulls centre Hendricks.

“(The pain) of losing in the final? Yeah, but also of losing Cornal Hendricks. So, let’s not underestimate that,” White said.

“I said it many times that what happens, sometimes you need a why and a reason.

“You look at what happened to Munster when Axel Foley died, how that whole club just galvanised and took another step up...

“I’ve got no doubt, having lost in finals, we’ve done it twice now, and having lost a guy like Cornal is something that gives us a reality check, because it is what it is.

“Sports guys, they know each other. You know, we miss him clapping hands or doing the rituals he used to do.

“And I’m hoping, that’s the sort of added value that we can have.

“We’re going to do something for him in the next three weeks on our jerseys and that sort of thing.

“And the message is very simple: it’s not just a symbolic thing. It must be an action thing as well.

“So, hopefully it’ll be a reason for us to play better, and a reason for us to make sure if we get to these knockout games, we play as well as we can.”

The Bulls’ 34-28 defeat to Edinburgh in the Challenge Cup was nearly a victory, as the visitors mounted a strong comeback at the end of the game at Hive Stadium.

White said at the time that they basically ran out of time, and with the injury situation looking even better now, the Bulls have all the ingredients to emerge victories on Saturday.

The coach confirmed that flyhalf Johan Goosen and prop Gerhard Steenekamp are definitely not ready this week, although Goosen might still play a role if they make the semis or final as he is starting to train this week.

Keagan Johannes has been excellent in the No 10 jersey anyway, so he will be expected to guide a classy backline around Loftus and test the likes of Duhan van der Merwe and Darcy Graham in the Edinburgh back-three.

The Bulls’ outstanding loose-forward group, including SA URC Player of the Season nominee Cameron Hanekom, will also look to win the race for the loose ball against seasoned Edinburgh Test flank Hamish Watson.

“We finished well against them. That gives me hope,” White said.

“There’ll be a lot of things that I’ll look at that game and know that if I’m a little bit more... I don’t want to say streetwise, but a little bit more aware of what happened last time, it may help us in our favour.

“But also, we also know that we lost to Glasgow in the final, because we let them score on halftime with a penalty we gave away.

“And we didn’t score in the last minute of the game with a driving lineout.

“So, there’s a lot of other lessons that we could have learned.

“So, for me, it’s about 80 minutes and about getting all those little things right anyway.”