UNAM’S dominance in Namibian club rugby will be severely tested on Saturday when they take on United in the semifinals of the Premier League at the Hage Geingob National Rugby Stadium.
Unam have won the Premier League title for the past three years, but their dominance has come under threat this season after they suffered their first defeats in three years.
Wanderers ended that fantastic run with a 37-34 victory in April, and then United also beat them 41-36 three weeks ago.
Last week, Unam were once again pushed all the way before beating Wanderers 39-35, and their coach Johan Diergaardt admitted that the gap between them and the chasing pack is narrowing.
Besides this, Diergaardt also has to contend with a growing injury list, with Sylvano Beukes definitely out, while Sunday Haitembu, Camlo Martin, Cameron Klazen, Milaan van Wyk and captain Bradley Klazen are all carrying niggling injuries.
“I don’t know if we have enough depth, but we are positive that we will play good rugby and that we will be in our fourth successive final this year,” Diergaardt said.
“It will be strange if we don’t make it, so that’s a motivation in itself – Unam’s 2018 team don’t want to fail,” he said.
Diergaardt said he was not too perturbed about their earlier defeat to United.
“We are aware of the challenge that United will bring – we didn’t play very well against them and they exploited that, so we’ll have to improve on that. But we were much better against Wanderers last week and our performances have shown an upward curve of late,” he said.
A number of Unam’s top players are unavailable due to national squad duties but they will still be able to field a formidable side, with the likes of Hauta Veii, Tjino Tjirare, Muniovita Kasiringua and Renaud van Neel up front, and TC Kisting, Denver Murorua and Lorenzo Louis in the backline.
United’s forward play has improved a lot this season and with players like captain Winmar Rust, Jason Benade, Niel van Vuuren and Shaun van Rooi in the pack they can be sure of getting their fair share of possession from the set pieces. Then they also have some match winners in the backline, none more so than their elusive fullback Riaan van Zyl, who is sure to pose a threat to Unam.
Not much has separated the two teams this season, with Unam winning their first match 25-24 while United won the second 41-36 and Saturday’s match should once again go down to the wire.
Their match is due to start at 18h45 and will be preceded by the other semifinal between Western Suburbs and Wanderers, which should also be a close affair.
Suburbs haven’t lost to Wanderers this season – winning their first round match in March 30-27 and then once again prevailing 33-27 three months later, but Wanderers’ coach Vince Dreyer was in confident mood on Thursday.
“We are positive and I think it will be very difficult for Suburbs to beat us three times in a season. In our previous matches we lost due to our goal kicking and if you look at the overall statistics in the league, we have scored the second most tries behind Unam, so that gives us confidence,” he said.
“Last week we made some silly mistakes against Unam that led to tries, but our attack and defence is good so we are ready and looking forward to the match.”
Wanderers also have numerous players in the national squad, while they lost Christo van der Merwe due to a knee injury last week, but they can still field a formidable side, with players like Janry du Toit, Jamie Joseph and Enem Kritzinger amongst the backs and Nian Berg, Stef Botha, Denzil van Wyk and Adriaan Booysen amongst the forwards.
Suburbs’ coach Shaun Kaizemi said they would learn from their previous mistakes and were confident of winning their match.
“We have lost to Wanderers in the semifinals for the past two years, so we will learn from our previous mistakes. In the past we focused too much on our opponents, but now we will just focus on our own game,” he said.
“I think we gained a lot of experience in the Gold Cup last year so we are quietly confident and looking forward to the match,” he said.
Suburbs will field a strong and mobile pack with regular loose forward Victor Giggs turning out at hooker, while James Kisting and Fidel Micolleney should win their fair share of line-out possession.
Amongst the backs they also have some match winners like the speedy Collins Omalu and powerful Nikin Cloete, while the experience and consistency of captain Justin Nel at fly half will be crucial to their hopes.
