Bulls boss Johan Ackermann switches focus to Champions Cup

Bulls boss Johan Ackermann switches focus to Champions Cup

Bulls coach Johan Ackerman admitted his charges will have to be better when they face Glasgow Warriors in the Champions Cup Round of 16 clash on Saturday.

The Pretoria franchise is coming off a nail-biting 34-31 win over a resurgent Munster side at Loftus Versfeld on Saturday. The result keeps them in eighth place on the United Rugby Championship table, the final playoff berth.

But now the Bulls must prepare for a difficult trip to Scotland, where they face a rampant Glasgow side that is leading the URC, went unbeaten in the Champions Cup pool stage and clearly have European glory on their mind.

"If we're in the play-offs in the Champions Cup, we must give it a go and give it our best shot, and then we'll take it from there," said Ackermann.

"Glasgow is the next challenge, but we'll need to be better than we were today. They'll definitely punish us if we defensively make the errors we made today, so they'll be a massive challenge.

"They're probably the best attacking side in the competition, so we have a big challenge ahead of us, but we've got nothing to lose.

"We're going to go there and really go hard and give ourselves an opportunity. If we progress, that would be great. I think then we'll have to give it a run. We can't control what happens after that. When we return to the URC, we'll have to play our best team available.

"At the moment it's a privilege to play in a Champions Cup Round of 16 match, it's one of the best competitions in the world, so we'll have to give it our best.

"We'll have a light training session on Monday to put a few plans in place for Glasgow, and then we'll fly out on Monday evening. Tuesday will be a chill day to get the players' bodies rested, and Wednesday we'll have a training and recovery session to get the players' bodies intact after the flight. On Thursday we'll have a tough session, and Friday will be the captain's run before Saturday's clash."

READ MORE: Bulls survive Munster fightback to edge high-scoring URC thriller at Loftus