Variety the spice of life for red-hot Bulls No 8 Cameron Hanekom against URC champs Glasgow

Cameron Hanekom is just a few weeks short of his 23rd birthday, but is already a marked man on a rugby field.

In the recent Challenge Cup quarter-final against Edinburgh, the Bulls No 8 seemed to have three defenders on him almost every time he got the ball.

The Pretoria side eventually went down 34-28 at the Hive Stadium, and a large part of that was down to their star loose forward being unable to break free from the hosts’ defensive shackles.

Coach Jake White said that Hanekom is talented enough to overcome the special attention with time, and it took the former Paarl Boys’ High prodigy just a week to fix things as he was back to his explosive best in last week’s 16-13 win over Munster.

He was much more aggressive on attack and defence, carrying with greater conviction in the face of a fierce Munster line and putting in big tackles throughout the 80 minutes.

Hanekom also earned a few vital breakdown penalties as he got his timing just right, and aims to continue in that vein in Friday’s massive United Rugby Championship showdown against reigning winners Glasgow Warriors in Scotland (8.35pm kick-off).

“The decision-making is the key. You only get a split second or half-gap to decide whether you will go for it or fold to get width on defence,” the dynamic loose forward said from Glasgow on Tuesday.

“In the past, I’ve made some silly mistakes and went into too many rucks and didn’t get rewarded for it.

“You are not always going to get the reward, but having confidence going into it and knowing that you are going to give your absolute best...

“You can’t go half-hearted into breakdowns, but I don’t want my defence just to be based on breakdowns, so I’ve been trying to improve on tackling more.

“If I play with a guy like Marcell (Coetzee), who makes 31 tackles in a game, I know I must lift my game as well so that I don’t disappoint him.

“My biggest work-on was my tackling. I felt that there were some games where I didn’t tackle well enough.

“I want to keep my tackling consistent and improve it.”

Hanekom is likely to be watched closely by the Glasgow defence on Friday at Scotstoun Stadium, where the Bulls will be eager to avenge last year’s URC final defeat at Loftus Versfeld.

But the one-cap Springbok, who hails from Ceres in the Western Cape, must find a way to adapt his game to the 4G pitch as well.

The visitors need to put pressure on the Warriors with their own attacking game too, and not just bank on another heroic defensive effort that won them the Munster game in Limerick.

“There are some games where you don’t get the ball as often. Just trying to get yourself in the right position on the field, working hard to get there as well... Nothing is going to be given to you,” Hanekom said.

“That’s why I also saw after Edinburgh, to just be able to tackle-fight through that contact.

“Also sometimes just shifting the point of contact would also help us if four people come onto me, and I can play a little pass or so.

“It’s just trying to get that variation of what to do and when to do it.

“It’s (4G pitch) definitely something you have to adapt to. Obviously I prefer playing on grass – the grass-burns aren’t that bad!

“So, I try to not focus too much on the 4G pitch. Obviously it feels a bit lighter, when it comes to explosiveness, but I just try to focus on the controllables and game at hand.

“For me, detail is everything. Going through their clips, analysing how they play, what their players do in specific roles and the parts of the field and stuff like that...

“That gives me a lot of confidence: having a bigger picture of what they could do on the day.

“When we all fight for each other, it helps me mentally, knowing that the brother next to me has got my back – so I can go in flat-out, because the guy next to me is not going to drop me.

“Most of their players have played international rugby, so it’s going to be a good match-up.

“You want those big names to play against us – that’s who you want to get measured against.

“No disrespect to them as they are great players, but we definitely going to go out there and try to prove a point.”