Cheetahs punish ill-disciplined Bulls
The Bulls conceded two penalty tries for scrum infringements in the second half as Franco Smith's young guns secured a well-earned victory.
The Cheetahs drew first blood in the 10th minute when captain Reniel Hugo got the first points of the match. Flyhalf Neil Marais made no mistake with the conversion to take the lead to 7-0.
It took the Bulls a further 23 minutes to register their first points of the match thanks to the boot of flyhalf Tian Schoeman, who slotted a penalty. The Bulls' joy would be short-lived though as Hugo grabbed his brace a minute later, with Marais adding the extras to hand the Bloemfontein-based side take a 14-3 lead.
The score would remain unchanged as the sides went into the half-time interval.
The Bulls made numerous changes at the break and it seemed to have injected more pace to the encounter. The Bulls found their reward when Kefenste Mahalo's great chase placed pressure on the Cheetahs' defence. Schoeman got his hands on the ball and made a break from five metres out to grab the Bulls' first try of the match.
He picked himself up and slotted the conversion to reduce the deficit to 10-14. The rain started to fall with about 25 minutes and it took its toll on the players as the pace of the game slowed down dramatically.
The Cheetahs were dominant at scrum time and after a number of infringements, referee Jaco Peyper was forced to award the Cheetahs a penalty try. Things went from bad to worse for the Bulls as they continued to infringe close to their try line at scrum time and conceded a second penalty try, to hand the Cheetahs a 28-10 lead.
Scorers:
For Bulls:
Try: Schoeman
Con: Schoeman
Pen: Schoeman
For Cheetahs:
Tries: Hugo 2, Penalty try 2
Cons: Marais 4
Teams:
Bulls: 15 Divan Rossouw, 14 Kefentse Mahlo, 13 Dries Swanepoel, 12 Dan Kriel, 11 Jade Stighling, 10 Tian Schoeman, 9 Piet van Zyl, 8 Hanro Liebenberg, 7 Nicolaas Janse van Rensburg, 6 Freddy Ngoza, 5 Marvin Orie (captain), 4 Jason Jenkins, 3 Werner Kruger, 2 Callie Visagie, 1 Lizo Gqoboka.
Replacements – from: Jaco Visagie, Pierre Schoeman, Nqoba Mxoli, Irne Herbst, Riekert Hattingh, Ivan van Zyl, Francois Brummer, JT Jackson, Jamba Ulengo.
Cheetahs: 15 Gerrie Labuschagne, 14 Ruan van Rensburg, 13 Reinhardt Erwee, 12 Michael van der Spuy, 11 Clayton Blommetjies, 10 Niel Marais, 9 Tian Meyer, 8 Henco Venter, 7 Tienie Burger, 6 Paul Schoeman, 5 Reniel Hugo (captain), 4 Armandt Koster, 3 Luan de Bruin, 2 Jacques du Toit, 1 Danie Mienie.
Replacements – from: Torsten van Jaarsveld, Charles Marais, Maks van Dyk, Hilton Lobberts, Carl Wegner, Niell Jordaan, Shaun Venter, Fred Zeilinga, Francois Venter, Raymond Rhule.
Referee: Jaco Peyper
