Who’s hot and who’s not: ‘Very dangerous’ Bulls, PREM Rugby ‘legend’, Stormers’ ‘stupid red’ and Glasgow ‘bottlers’
The Bulls celebrate beating Glasgow but the URC semi-finals has a sting in the tail for Stormers' Ruan Ackermann
It’s time for our Monday wrap of who has their name in lights and who is making the headlines for all the wrong reasons after the weekend.
THEY’RE ON FIRE!
Bulls: Divorce was the prediction just last January for Johan Ackermann after he had bungled his first half-season in charge at the Pretoria franchise. So desperate were things that an SOS was sent for some of Rassie Erasmus’ assistants to come in and iron out the kinks and what a success that bold ploy has been, with a horrible seven-match losing streak now transformed by a run of 12 wins in 14 matches, the last six on the bounce culminating in Saturday’s superb 22-21 ambush of Glasgow in the United Rugby Championship semi-finals.
What has given the Bulls life is the cohesion of their opposition-strangling pack, but they are also putting tough love to good use. Indiscipline was their match-losing bugbear when they were ejected by Glasgow from the Champions Cup round of 16 nine weeks ago, but that adversity helped them find a way at the weekend back in Scotland and back under the pump. Their first-half 21-3 deficit was accompanied by two yellow cards, but they won that second sin-binning 7-0 and were also excellent in their 12-0 winning of a Glasgow card early in the second half. Some special forwards, special half-backs and a threat out wide. They have become a very dangerous team.
Cam Roigard: The All Blacks scrum-half claimed some weeks ago that it would be a “waste” if the free-scoring Hurricanes don’t go on to win their first Super Rugby title since 2016. We all know how cheap talk can be, so it was comforting to see the half-back make good his team’s first play-off step, Roigard scoring two first-half tries in the Canes’ 66-12 play-off demolition of the Brumbies.
The play-offs are supposed to be about the best of the best teams clashing, but the New Zealand franchise, with Roigard pulling the strings, were unplayable last Friday, registering a nine tries to two victory without breaking a sweat and the expectation is that the Blues will also be swatted aside in next Saturday’s semi-finals, another match primed for the 25-year-old to further highlight the growing intelligence and maturity of his play. It bodes well for him to go on and have his best Test rugby season.
Thomas du Toit: The 31-year-old tighthead arrived in the PREM in 2023 as the player who, some months earlier in a Test match, had melted Luke Cowan-Dickie with a red-carded shot to the head at Twickenham. Thankfully, that was a false first impression of a player who has since achieved iconic status at Bath where Johann van Graan doesn’t beat about the bush in singing his fellow countryman’s praises.
Fresh from seeing the prop score his first career hat-trick in Saturday’s win over Leicester, the coach was at it again with the superlatives. “Legend”. “Incredible man”. “Incredible human being”. He sure is with the way he has delivered so much bang for buck during his three seasons at The Rec. His contribution has been immense, and there is every chance that after the win 24-22 over Leicester secured home ground semi-final advantage his farewell before the switch to the Sharks will be in the PREM final back at Twickenham, scene of that red card all those years ago.
Jamison Gibson-Park: The 34-year-old New Zealander provided a sharp reminder of his immense value to Leinster and Irish rugby with his result-deciding try to bury Stormers’ URC title hopes for another year. It was 2016 when the Maori All Black scrum-half arrived in Dublin and it took quite some time to elevate himself from his initial 15-minute man bench role.
It was Andy Farrell who saw something in him that Leo Cullen didn’t, ignoring the provincial pecking order to vault Gibson-Park into the Test starting line-up in October 2020 and the rest, as they say, is history. Post-Johnny Sexton’s retirement, his stature has only grown more and his opportunism was the crucial difference on Saturday at the Aviva in his team’s 20-11 win. With veteran Luke McGrath soon leaving for France, the huge challenge for Leinster next season is to find some reliable cover behind Gibson-Park. That will be hard, as he is miles ahead of every other nine at the club and continues to shoot the lights out nearly every time he play.
Henry Slade: We gave a rave review to Exeter in last week’s column following their smash-and-grab success at Leicester and Rob Baxter’s side were just as entertaining in Saturday’s seminal win over Saracens, which confirmed a semi-final spot for the Chiefs and heralded a deflating end to Mark McCall’s trophy-laden time in charge of the Londoners. There would have been no love lost between these clubs at the weekend, as it was Exeter who lost most during those seasons when Saracens won titles that wound up part of the salary cap scandal.
The opportunity to put a sorry end to the McCall era was just perfect for Exeter, and in the 33-year-old Slade they had someone with the scars from those historic losses and bulling to make his mark. In the end, it was a comfortable 32-12 win for the Sandy Park club, but it was hard fought and in the thick of it was Slade. His two-touch involvement in the attack from inside his own half, which he finished for a 47th-minute try, was crucial at a time when Exeter led by just two points, and he went on to top the carries, posting a reminder that he is a silky, threatening ball player, something we simply haven’t seen enough of at Test level due to Steve Borthwick’s unadventurous approach.
Ronan O’Gara: We said several weeks ago the fortunes of La Rochelle were something to keep an eye on in France and how right we were, as the winter strugglers became summer’s ray of hope in a spectacular final round in the French league. The permutations were exhilarating, and the puzzle ended with the two-time European champions sneaking into the sixth and final play-off spot after the defeated Stade Francais 27-22 and Clermont beat current Champions Cup champions Bordeaux 34-31 with a late Harry Plummer drop goal. You also had Racing defeating Toulouse 31-20.
Those results levered the Nolann Le Garrec-inspired La Rochelle into sixth place on 72 points, two points behind the fifth-place Racing on 74 but, most importantly, pipping the seventh-place Clermont on 71 and the eighth-place Bordeaux on 70. It was the sixth win in a row for O’Gara’s side and they will have no fear now about going to Stade Francais next Sunday in the opening round of the play-offs. Their renaissance has shown another side to the Irishman’s coaching, keeping the faith in a difficult season where they could so easily have wound up finishing on the lower rungs of the table. Staying in France, a shoutout to Vannes on their Pro D2 title win over Provence and their promotion back to Top 14.
Andy Farrell and Tony Brown: With the business of rugby a precarious task, unions committing to long-term deals is a risk, but Ireland and New Zealand have both made big statements in recent days with the contracts awarded to Farrell and Brown. The IRFU have historically made a mess with its long-term planning, agreeing to contract extensions that didn’t work. Look, for instance, how their extended pre-2007 World Cup deal with Eddie O’Sullivan worked out. The poor chap had resigned by March 2008.
Farrell’s track record, of course, is impressive, but giving him a deal through to the 2031 World Cup is quite the leap and heaps pressure on the coach and the IRFU to deliver success at 2027’s tournament or else be left looking very foolish and premature. As for the All Blacks investing in Brown in 2028 after he assists the Springboks at the ’27 finals, that’s a sign of how much they are believing in incoming boss Dave Rennie despite how problematic the recent eras of Ian Foster and Scott Robertson were. Big deals, huge votes of confidence.
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Dave Rennie: Mention of Rennie, he will arrive in his All Blacks tracksuit with an added pep in his step after leading Kobelco Kobe Steelers to its Japan League One title win over Kubota Spears. It was 2018, when Wayne Smith was at the helm, when Kobe last emerged as Japan’s best, and their 22-13 victory in front of a 50,451 attendance in Tokyo was significant.
Not since 2013, when the Chiefs won Super Rugby, had Rennie guided a team to a club title. It was also a breakthrough for some of Kobe’s legendary All Blacks. Brodie Retallick hadn’t won a club title since playing under Rennie at the Chiefs 13 years ago, and the triumph bridged a 10-year gap for Ardie Savea stretching back to his 2016 Super success with the Hurricanes. These lengthy gaps between titles are an illustration that even the greats of the Test game might not be serial club winners, so Kobe’s victory is certainly something for them to cherish.
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COLD AS ICE!
Ruan Ackermann: A penny for John Dobson’s behind-closed-doors conversation with his sub back-rower about the stupid red-carded clean-out in Dublin. The Stormers coach held his hands at the post-game media briefing, admitting he had apologised to Leinster boss Cullen for Ackermann’s reckless 69th-minute breakdown collision with Ronan Kelleher at a juncture in the game where the South African’s trailed by just two points and were still in with a great chance of winning through to the final against the Bulls.
At the age of 30, Ackermann didn’t have the excuse of inexperience for his troubling tucked shoulder to the head, and his poor decision was evidence of why he hasn’t made the step up to Test rugby. Within a minute of his yellow-carded expulsion, a sanction soon upgraded to red, Leinster were in under the posts and the anticipated grandstand finish was snuffed out with the nails in the coffin drilled in by Salmaan Moerat’s carding for an illegal ball kick in the lead up to the score. Benches are supposed to add energy and fight, but Stormers’ back-ups instead counted them out of the fight and it was a brutal way for them to end a season of so much promise.
Glasgow: Getting gored by a bull isn’t pretty, and the demise of Franco Smith’s so-called Warriors made for difficult viewing at the weekend. They can’t be accused of being out-and-out bottlers; after all, they were URC champions in 2024, defeating Munster and the Bulls on the road to win the title. However, similar to Gregor Townsend’s Scotland team who let you down when the most is expected from them, there is a glitch in the Glasgow psyche when they are fancied to deliver top-end results.
Their No.2 seeding in the Champions Cup, which would have given them a home semi-final, was blow apart by their quarter-final defeat to Toulon and now their No.1 URC seeding, which would have meant a June 20 final at Murrayfield, has gone up in smoke with the chastening one-point loss to the Bulls, a defeat where the bitterest pill was not scoring in the remaining 55 minutes after vaulting into a 21-3 lead. It was a sickening way to lose, and the criticism that has gone their way since referee Andy Brace’s full-time whistle was fully deserved.
Bordeaux: What a difference a fortnight makes in rugby. The French club’s first-half destruction of Leinster on May 23 generated so many positive headlines effusive in its praise for emphatically clinching back-to-back Champions Cup titles. Now, Yannick Bru’s side is the butt of the joke in the Top 14, losing at home in the final round and failing to secure the top six finish necessary to qualify for next weekend’s quarter-finals. Inexcusably for a team so impressively dominant in Europe, four of their last six league matches ended in defeat.
There was chat in the aftermath about their iffy start to this season, but the sorest point has to be how they have blown promising situations in their games since hammering Leinster. They were 22-21 up at Toulon only to lose 22-27. Then, on Saturday night, they were ahead 24-14 at the interval and lost 31-34 at home to Clermont despite being level with six minutes remaining. Champions of Europe, yes, but a team not able to handle the delicate balance of managing those celebrations and still getting over the line in the league. Their eighth-place finish is a spectacular failure.
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Brumbies: We’ve grown used to the Australian side failing to deliver Super Rugby, but the Canberra franchise’s no-show at the Hurricanes was further proof that there is no such thing as a genuine trans-Tasman rivalry in the competition. The odds were firmly against Stephen Larkham’s side producing an upset result in Wellington, but you would have least expected them to be connected early on and make a fight of it.
Instead, they were blown away in a disturbing fashion that only added to the argument that Super Rugby should go straight to semi-finals after its regular season and not have six teams making the play-offs in an 11-team league. The Brumbies fell behind on six minutes and were well-beaten by the interval, traipsing off 38-7 down in a match they went on to lose by an embarrassing 54-point margin. After four successive semi-finals losses away to New Zealand teams where the margins were one, 13, 14 and 20 points, Friday’s surrender was a nadir offering zero consolation.
Saracens: The PREM Rugby romantics had been champing at the bit in recent weeks about how the Londoners could reach the play-offs and send director of rugby McCall off into the sun with another title, but the story of their 2025/26 campaign ended a couple of chapters short as they ultimately weren’t up for the second-half fight at Exeter and instead finished fifth on the table.
It turned out that the previous weekend’s 53-minute spell without a score against Harlequins was down to the excessive heat on the day; it was symptomatic of the in-game consistencies that have robbed Saracens of their once-feared menace. They went 64 minutes in between scores at Sandy Park in an outing where their discipline let them down. It resulted in McCall receiving a send-off reflective of their recent frustrating seasons, not a throwback to happier times of dominance.