Sharks have too much bite for Boland

Man of the match: Our choice, Ryan Kankowski

The Sharks, despite battling a few injuries in their camp this week, proved too strong for the Boland Cavaliers in Wellington on Saturday; the Durbanites claiming a valuable 26-12 Absa Currie Cup victory.

The teams went into half-time level at 12-12, but two quick Sharks tries in the first few minutes of the second half put the result beyond doubt, flanker and captain of the day Jacques Botes and livewire No.8 Ryan Kankowski both crossing within minutes of each other.

Scrum-half Rory Kockott slotted both conversions for a handy 26-12 lead and the Sharks never looked back from that point onwards - even if the rest of the match failed to produce another point.

Boland fly-half Isma-eel Dollie slotted four first-half penalties to keep his team in touch, but first-half tries from Sharks youngsters, lock Nikolai Blignaut and exciting flanker Keegan Daniel, kept the visitors in the match before their bonus-point clinching start to the second half.

Former SA Under-19 and U21 star Dollie - who is on loan from Western Province this season - opened the scoring for Boland with his first penalty in the seventh minute after referee Jonathan Kaplan penalised the Sharks for not rolling away at the tackle.

The Sharks, however, hit back when lock Blignaut charged down an attempted clearance from Boland full-back Renfred Dazel, the big lock doing well to collect the ball and dot down. Scrum-half Kockott - the Natalians' kicker in the absence of Butch James, Percy Montgomery and Frans Steyn - added the extras to put the visitors ahead by 7-3.

Two more Dollie penalties cancelled out Blignaut's try, putting the home team ahead by 9-7 after 26 minutes, but Keegan Daniel crashed over from a rolling maul five minutes later to put the visitors back ahead by 12-9.

Kockott missed the conversion of Daniel's try, but Dollie chipped over his fourth penalty to leave the scores tied at 12-all - much to the crowd's delight, who, perhaps, were sensing another upset...

The start of the second half was always going to be key in this contest, but the Sharks were well up to the challenge at hand.

Skipper Botes scored in the 41st minute after the visitors charged ahead from the kick-off, but the outstanding Kankowski delivered the coup de grâce with a fantastic individual score from the re-start.

Kankowski took the re-start, powered ahead and kicked; collected the ball and powered through the flat-footed, and stunned, Boland defence for the bonus-point clinching score in the right-hand corner. Kockott rubbed even more salt into Boland's wounds with his third conversion of the day and from then on there was going to be only one winner.

To their credit, however, the Bolanders did not give up; Dollie's smart break leading to a Stefan Terblanché trip, which saw him sin-binned, but once the veteran Sharks No.15 returned to the fray 10 minutes later, the visitors were not really flustered again.

In fact, the Sharks - who ended the match one man up when Dries van Schalkwyk was yellow-carded - very nearly finished the match with their fifth try of the day, only to be denied by more desperate Boland defence.

Man of the match: Boland's Dries van Schalkwyk tried hard and former Bolander Stefan Terblanché used all of his experience at the back for the Sharks. Our Man of the match, however, was the Sharks' multi-talented No.8 Ryan Kankowski, who showed plenty of pace and skill, yet he never shirked the hard work up front, either. This man has Springbok stamped all over him!

The scorers:

For the Boland Cavaliers:

Tries:

Cons:

Pens: Dollie 4

DGs:

For the Sharks:

Tries: Blignaut, Daniel, Botes, Kankowski

Cons: Kockott 3

Pens:

DGs:

Yellow cards: Stefan Terblanché (Sharks, 58th minute), Dries van Schalkwyk (Boland, 83rd minute)

Teams:

Boland: 15 Renfred Dazel, 14 John Daniels, 13 Piet van Zyl, 12 Hennie Daniller, 11 Jongi Nokwe, 10 Isma-eel Dollie, 9 Dewald Duvenhage, 8 Francois Prinsloo, 7 Henley du Plessis, 6 Angelo Brinkhuys, 5 Coenie Basson, 4 Dries van Schalkwyk, 3 Tommy Dixon, 2 Conrad Burke (captain),1 Janro van Niekerk.

Replacements: 16 Clement Lewis, 17 Jané du Toit, 18 Randile Julies, 19 Chris Potgieter, 20 Neil Papier, 21 Lionel Cornelius, 22 Justin Peach.

Sharks: 15 Stefan Terblanché, 14 Dusty Noble, 13 Gcobani Bobo, 12 Andries Strauss, 11 Henno Mentz, 10 Bradley Barritt, 9 Rory Kockott, 8 Ryan Kankowski, 7 Keegan Daniel, 6 Jacques Botes (captain), 5 Nikolai Blignaut, 4 Steven Sykes, 3 Patric Cilliers, 2 Skipper Badenhorst, 1 Tendai 'Beast' Mtawarira.

Replacements: 16 Pellow van der Westhuizen, 17 Ronnie Uys, 18 Kees Lensing, 19 Jeandre Mynhardt, 20 AJ Venter, 21 Scott Mathie, 22 Monty Dumond.

Referee: Jonathan Kaplan (SARU)

Touch judges: Jaco Peyper (Free State), Johan Greeff (Blue Bulls)

Television match official: Lourens van der Merwe (Free State)

Assessor: Keith Hendricks