Coach reveals where it went wrong for the Lions

With the curtain having come down on the Lions’ inaugural season in the United Rugby Championship, coach Ivan van Rooyen believes it was the local round of matches at the start of the year that proved to be the difference between them making the play-offs and finishing 11th.

The Lions went into the new year as the top placed South African team and on a high having managed a comfortable win over the Stormers in Cape Town in early December.

They then went on a disastrous five-match losing run, as the Sharks, Bulls and Stormers all picked up wins in Johannesburg, while they also lost at Loftus and in Ireland against Leinster.

‘Crucial moments’

“Those four home games in South Africa in January and February were probably the point of difference for us. We just weren’t good enough,” explained Van Rooyen.

“That first game against the Sharks at Ellis Park, I think we did enough to win it, there were just one or two crucial moments that didn’t go our way.

“After beating the Stormers in Cape Town (in December) we were pretty disappointed by not beating them back home. So if you take those two games we probably would have made it into the play-offs.”

The Lions now have two more games left in their Currie Cup campaign, this weekend against Western Province at Ellis Park and next weekend against the Sharks in Durban.

Following those matches the team will have an extended break before getting back together for a long pre-season to prepare for their second crack at the URC.

Looking back at their first season in the URC the Lions can be relatively proud of having finished in 11th place with eight wins and 10 losses, and they will now look to improve on the things they did right and fix the things they did wrong ahead of the new season later this year.

‘One win from top 10’

“Our game management needs some improvement and consistency. I think physically we grew in the competition. Our set piece has been good the whole season. Our kicking game in general has gotten better as the season progressed, but still needs a bit of development,” said Van Rooyen following his team’s last match last weekend, a win against the Dragons.

“Our attack is growing, but we probably force it a little too much and our defence is at a place where we can start polishing it. So, I think we are about 15% from where we want to be.

“We are about one win away from the top 10 and two wins away from the top eight, so there are a lot of positives (from the first season) but a lot of things we still need to work on.”