Springbok-heavy Bulls squad head north vowing to 'give it best shot'

Vodacom Bulls boss Johan Ackermann is not holding anything back for this weekend’s Champions Cup Round of 16 tie away to URC leaders Glasgow, having selected 14 Springboks in his travelling squad.

Since being added to the Champions Cup in 2022/23, no South African side has made it beyond the quarter-finals stages of the competition.

And the Bulls haven’t been dealt an easy draw because even if they see off a Glasgow side flying high under Franco Smith, they’ll come up against three-times former champions Toulon or the Stormers in the last eight.

Momentum is certainly behind the South African sides, though, having achieved a clean sweep of wins in the last two rounds of the URC. The Bulls edged Munster 34-31, while the Sharks, Stormers and Lions also won at home.

“If we’re in the play-offs in the Champions Cup, we must give it a go. We will give it our best shot, and then we’ll take it from there,” said Ackermann.

“Glasgow are in front of us this week, but we’ll need to be better than we were against Munster if we hope to win.

“They’ll definitely punish us if we defensively make the errors we made today, so they’ll be a massive challenge.

“They’re probably the best attacking side in the competition, so we have a big challenge ahead of us, but we’ve got nothing to lose.

“We’re going to go there and really go hard and give ourselves an opportunity [to win].

“If we progress, that would be great. I think then we’ll have to give it [Champions Cup] a run.”

The trip to Scotland precedes two URC fixtures in the UK, against the Dragons (April 17) and Scarlets (April 5) respectively, and the Stormers have travelled to the UK today 9Monday) with a party of 33.

“We can’t control what happens after that. When we return to the URC, we’ll have to play our [best] team available,.” he added.

“At the moment it’s a privilege to play in a Champions Cup Round of 16 match, it’s one of the best competitions in the world, so we’ll have to give it our best [shot].”

TOURING SQUAD

Gerhard Steenekamp/Alulutho Tshakweni/Jan-Hendrik Wessels
Johan Grobbelaar/Marco van Staden
Mornay Smith/Francois Klopper/Khuta Mchunu
Ruan Vermaak/Cobus Wiese
Ruan Nortje/Reinhardt Ludwig/JF van Heerden
Marcell Coetzee/Jeandre Rudolph
Elrigh Louw/Mpilo Gumede
Cameron Hanekom
Embrose Papier/Paul de Wet/Zak Burger
Handre Pollard/Keagan Johannes
Kurt-Lee Arendse/ Sergeal Petersen
Harold Vorster/Stedman Gans
Canan Moodie/Katlego Letebele
Cheswill Jooste/Devon Williams
David Kriel/Willie le Roux

UNAVAILABLE

Akker vd Merwe, Nizaam Carr, Wilco Louw.