Stransky: Sharks attack lacks bite
Former Springbok flyhalf Joel Stransky says the Sharks must be more accurate and less predictable with ball in hand.
The Durbanites finished third on the Vodacom URC log with 13 wins from 18 matches, while winning the SA Shield for the first time, but have played well below their best throughout the season.
Last Saturday’s performance against Scarlets at Kings Park was one of their worst, with four penalty goals giving John Plumtree’s team an ugly 12-3 win.
Plumtree admitted after the match that they’d “have to be better than that” to progress past the quarter-finals of the competition.
The Sharks host sixth-placed Munster on 31 May.
“It’s easy to look at their performances and say that someone like [Bok lock] Eben Etzebeth, who is a mainstay for the Sharks, has been unavailable for a lot of games, but there must be other reasons why the team is not performing properly. For me it’s pretty simple: something is missing in their attacking structure,” Stransky told News24.
“It’s been a while now that things just haven’t fallen into place. You look at the Irish teams and some of the others like the Glasgow Warriors and even Benetton, and they have these [attacking] waves coming at you. They target the steals and have second or third lines of attack following. Their decision-making is also spot on – they go wide when the opportunity arises and have good running lines when the ball should be carried up. To be honest, we don’t see any of that at the Sharks.
“You see ball-carriers being used one by one to get over the advantage line with their strength. But that strength and dominance on the advantage line means nothing because they don’t have an accurate attacking structure to deliver the knockout blow.”
Stransky – who helped the Sharks win their first Currie Cup title in 1990 – praised the team’s defence and “sensational” kicking game, but said they were too predictable with ball in hand inside the opposition 22.
“And because they’re predictable, the nerves start to jangle a bit on the opponent’s goalline and they lose the ball. Maybe they’re getting overzealous,” he added.
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