As the playoff fight heats up, the South African teams have shifted their attention back to the URC after completing qualification for European Cup tournaments.
This weekend, the four South African Vodacom United Rugby Championship teams will resume their duties with renewed vigor after qualifying for the playoff rounds of the Champions Cup and EPCR Challenge last weekend. This is a positive result for the local franchises.
There are only six rounds of pool matches remaining including this week’s matchups when the URC begins Round 13 on Friday.
On Friday night, the Bulls and Stormers will kick off the action, with Pretoria facing the Scarlets in Llanelli and Cape Town facing Ulster in Belfast.
On Saturday night, the other two local franchises will compete, with Edinburgh hosting the Sharks in Scotland and Connacht facing the Lions in Galway.
The Bulls, who are currently in third place on the log behind Leinster and the Stormers with 39 points, will look to build on their victory against the Dragons on the road in their most recent outing, and the fact that the Scarlets have only won three of their 12 matches this season will give them confidence.
However, the visitors will be aware of the fact that two of the home team’s three victories were at Llanelli, where they also drew in the opening encounter of the campaign. In addition, the Scarlets are coming off a morale-boosting away victory against Cardiff in their most recent URC match.
The Bulls have been more productive offensively and defensively, and they have the added incentive of remaining ahead of Ulster and Glasgow in the standings, who both have a game in hand.
The Stormers will play Ulster in a difficult test at the Kingspan Stadium, where a victory would be crucial to give them breathing room in the top two of the standings as the tournament nears the quarterfinals. The Cape side is 11 points behind the league-leading Leinster, while they retain a slim six-point edge over the Bulls.
The visitors have been somewhat more effective on offense, scoring nine more points, but they will try to capitalize on their formidable defense, which has placed them among the top three defensive teams.
Intriguingly, Ulster have lost three of their past four league matches and two of their last three against the Stormers, while the Capetonians have won only one of their last four road games.
The ninth-placed Sharks will want to displace Edinburgh from the top eight on the table on Saturday in order to position themselves favorably for a top-eight berth in the coming weeks, given that they trail Edinburgh by only one log point despite having two matches in hand.
Edinburgh, who defeated the Sharks in Durban when these teams played for the first time last season, have scored 37 more points in their 12 matches this season, but the Durbanites will take heart from the fact that they have won more matches.
They will also be eager to avenge their losses against Connacht in the URC and Harlequins in the Champions Cup in two of their most recent three contests.
In URC, South African teams compete against one another.
»SA teams seek playoff berths in URC preview«