We take it on the chin, says disappointed Sharks coach Powell

As he surveyed the wreckage of their 46-19 United Rugby Championship (URC) hammering by the Stormers at Kings Park on Saturday, Sharks coach Neil Powell said they take the disappointment on the chin.    

The Stormers scored six tries through Herschel Jantjies, Ruben van Heerden, Joseph Dweba, Seabelo Senatla, Suleiman Hartzenberg and Manie Libbok as they dominated the game to maintain second spot on the standings.

The Sharks managed only three tries, one from Dan Jooste and a pair from Gerbrandt Grobler, in a disappointing performance that Powell admitted lacked conviction.

“Definitely this was not a good performance from us. Maybe we were still locked in the game of last week’s win over Edinburgh away from home. We didn’t pitch up for this one. This is a huge disappointment from our mental approach side more than anything else,” he said.

Powell urged his players to take lessons from this heavy loss at home to their rivals because the season still has a way to go. 

“A good lesson for us, we must take it on the chin, no excuses. We have to learn from our mistakes. We knew the Stormers are a team that will punish you if you make mistakes. That’s exactly what they did.

“Again, it was our mental preparations coming into this game. I don’t know [why] we thought after the Edinburgh game that this would be an easy game playing the Stormers at home.

“We are obviously disappointed as the coaching staff. We will look at ourselves first and then ask the questions of the team to find out what we could have done better as a team.

“Just not a good enough performance as a team. We take it on the chin and obviously we will have to look at it and learn from it,” said Powell while asking for consistency.

“We can’t get into the situation where we play so well and show character and the next one there is nothing of that. We almost undid all the good things we did in that game against Edinburgh.

“We will definitely have a hard look at ourselves to make sure that we don’t find ourselves in this situation again. I do think there is a little bit of inconsistency over the last two games that we have played. It is a difficult thing to get consistency right every single time, but then again there are no excuses.

“If you want to be a champion team you have to get up every single time to show we are mentally prepared for whatever the opposition brings,” he said.