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Sharks behemoth Eben Etzebeth has heaped praise on his teammates ahead of their United Rugby Championship quarterfinal clash against Munster this Saturday.
The Durban franchise has finished the 2024/2025 URC season in third on the table, their highest position since the competition began. But despite securing a home quarterfinal, there are plenty of grumblings from Sharks fans. Their Bok-laden squad has scraped through many a dour affair, drawing the ire of management and fans alike.
Etzebeth is all too aware of the optics, but pointed instead to the results.
"If you look at the results throughout the season, there are a few results that we're not happy about," the double World Cup winner told the press this week.
"But this season is our best yet. We ended third, with the Bulls and Leinster above us, so it was sort of successful.
"We have a home quarterfinal, and if we win that, we stay in South Africa for the semifinal - whether that is against the Bulls at Loftus Versfeld or Edinburgh at the Shark Tank.
"I understand if you look at the season, fans will be left frustrated. We, as players and coaches, are sometimes frustrated with ourselves. But whatever happened before doesn't count anymore.
"The play-offs are usually tight affairs, and we are used to it by now. I think last season we ended up 14th on the log and lost the tight matches, but we managed to turn it around and win them. So we're used to playing those games, and hopefully we don't have to make it that tight this time around.
Etzebeth is under no illusions as to the challenge that awaits against Munster, who have a culture of winning knockout matches.
"Munster are a good team, two seasons ago, they played a quarterfinal, semifinal, and final away from home [and won the tournament]," he recollected.
"They are used to playoff success and winning away from home in knockout games, which is important because everything you've done before doesn't count.
"They're are a quality side and it's probably going to come down to discipline on the day, or who's got the better goal-kicker.
"So it's a good opportunity for us to push a bit further in this competition, and having the home-ground advantage and doing it in front of our fans is a massive bonus."
