Jake White lauds new found confidence ahead of URC playoffs

Just a couple of weeks ago, the Pretoria franchise had lost ten straight matches across all competitions. But the Bulls appeared to have turned the corner, winning their last three Currie Cup clashes and putting on massive scores at home in their back-to-back URC fixtures against Zebre and a weakened Leinster.

In fact, the Bulls ran in no less than 20 tries in those URC matches and will head to Cape Town next week in fine form, primed for an upset.

"The last couple of weeks, not only have we won, but we have also played really well and we managed to get our game to the way we want to play it," White told rugby365.com.

"We know different games will ask different questions. The nice thing is that we have a lot of confidence in the style we are using. We know it's a style that can beat any team we play against.

"We have played against Currie Cup teams, against Zebre and Leinster - although it was not their best team - yet we still managed to keep our structure. We still managed to keep the shape of the way we want to play.

"We are still focussed on the things we want to do well in and that again creates confidence and it creates clarity for us going into these playoffs."

White added that there is comfort in the familiarity of the Stormers, despite the hosts being the outright favourites as defending champions.

"We got the Stormers and there are positives and negatives to that," he continued White.

"One of the massive positives is that we can stay at home and travel literally on the last day. We don™t have to leave early in the week. We know how disruptive leaving early in the week can be with training sessions and an extended squad that you have to take.

"Another positive is that last year they were champions and we got a chance to play against the champions. I suppose the other positive is that we know what to expect because we played the Stormers so many times as well."