It’s going to take more than just words for the Lions to bounce back

Johannesburg - If their words are anything to go by, then you should expect a massive backlash from the Emirates Lions on Saturday at Loftus Versveld when they face the Vodacom Bulls (kick-off 3pm) in what is shaping up to be a United Rugby Championship grudge match.

Every member of the Lions that has spoken this past week, has done so with an angry, almost embarrassed tone regarding their 34-10 loss to the self-same team at Emirates Airline Park last week. Indeed, after the defeat, Jaco Kriel stated unapologetically: “Every single one of us is going to have a hard look at ourselves and we must realise that it is a huge privilege to be here.”

A few days later, the Emirates Lions defence coach and Springbok legend Jaque Fourie said: “If you don’t have the heart and the attitude on the field, you can only take the horse so far …”

On Wednesday, while speaking to Independent Media, Lions tighthead confirmed the suspicion that there were some hard words exchanged this week within the squad.

“The quality of rugby we played this past weekend wasn’t good enough,” said Sadie.

“We had a chat on Monday and Jaco and the senior guys said, ‘Listen here boys, this isn’t who we are. We need to stand up from here and show the people what we actually stand for.’

“We’ve got through a lot of work that was done on Monday and Tuesday to rectify all the mistakes that we made because I just think it was one of those days that nothing worked ...

“With Jaco being honest, he didn’t do any talking around the bush, he was quite straight. He said, ‘listen, it’s just not good enough,’ and that is what we need from a senior player like Jaco.

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