The Sharks' season is on the line in Challenge Cup quarterfinal, says Bongi Mbonambi

The Durban franchise are wallowing near the bottom of the table in the United Rugby Championship, well out of contention for the playoffs. However, their form in the Challenge Cup saw them move into the knockouts as the top seed, earning them home matches.

The competition remains the Sharks' only hope of rescuing a difficult season¦ and Mbonambi revealed the players are all too aware of that.

"We want to make this competition very successful," the double World Cup winner told rugby365.com.

"There is a lot of pressure. We need to keep things simple and make sure that everyone buys into the plan.

"With the kind of players that we have and the kind of coaches that we have, we just need to go out there and deliver."

The Sharks have picked up momentum over the last month. They have won their last three matches across the two competitions, including a 47-3 feast featuring a hapless Zebre last week.

More importantly, that run also contained a 23-13 win over Edinburgh. However, many of their Scotland stars were rested given their participation in the Six Nations. As such, Mbonambi believes that a different and motivated outfit will run out at Kings Park on Saturday.

"We know that they are going to come here better prepped than before... I think they are going to come play with a better team," added the powerful hooker.

"We noticed last time that they were missing a couple of their key players and they just came back from playing Six Nations, so I think they are going to be fresh and more challenging this time, especially with a coach like [former Sharks coach] Sean Everitt.

"He knows how to prepare a team to come play down here in Durban and it's a quarterfinal, so they are definitely going to come back stronger."

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