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October 26 - The MTN Golden Lions are no longer a young, inexperienced side. They have come of age and have the experience to focus on doing their own thing.
That was the message from the Lions’ former World Cup winning Springbok Wikus van Heerden and his coach John Mitchell at the team announcement on Wednesday.
Van Heerden is the only one of the Lions who played in the last home final of the Golden Lions who lost to the Blue Bulls at Ellis Park in 2002.
"The great thing is that we are not a young group anymore; we went through a whole grooming process through Super 15 and are in our second year of Currie Cup," Van Heerden said. And Mitchell reiterated his philosophy over his tenure with the Lions: that they would not dwell too much on what the opposition will bring to the match and rather focus on what they needed to do to get the job done.
In a match where the Sharks pack on the face of it seem to hold the aces, there is the reality that the Lions match to the final have been built on a committed tight five an d excellent loose forwards.
"The set piece accuracy is very critical as is your ability to create pressure in that area," Mitchell said.
"The game hasn’t changed at all and you had an example of that over the weekend in the World Cup final. They are a very good side and very good forward pack with a heap of test players."
Therefore, Sharks, beware the Lions pack.
The Lions are also very much aware of their responsibility to bring the supporters back to Coca-Cola Park. On Wednesday there were hundreds of fans queuing for autographs before the team announcement.
"We got through our work and we are ready to go and obviously today (Wednesday) we wanted to connect with our community and fans."
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