Cape Town – Canan Moodie’s performances over the last few months – as well as his height – was enough to convince Bulls coach Jake White that he should hold on to the No 15 jersey in Friday’s United Rugby Championship semi-final against Leinster.
Kurt-Lee Arendse has been the first-choice fullback, but a fractured thumb in April has kept him off the field since.
And even though the former Blitzbok sevens star has recovered sufficiently to make the trip to Dublin this week, he will play off the bench at the RDS Arena (8.35pm SA time kickoff).
Teenager Moodie – who was included in the Junior Springbok side this week for the upcoming international season – has shown why White has such belief in him with a number of inspired displays in recent weeks.
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He has been solid under the high ball, has a decent kicking boot and is a strong defender, but most importantly, he has been able to replicate Arendse’s ability to get involved on attack at crucial times.
Moodie started out at right wing and could’ve returned to the No 14 jersey for the Leinster clash to accommodate Arendse, but David Kriel was retained in the starting line-up as well.
“To be fair, one of the things we’ve seen this year is every time we’ve brought someone back and put him straight into the starting line-up, he’s probably taken a while to find his feet – and that goes for every player we’ve brought back quickly. That back-three combination… they’re tall. I think there will be a lot of kicking, and I don’t really want to unsettle that combination if we don’t have to,” White explained from Dublin on Thursday.
“Kurt-Lee will probably come on anyway – I just feel that, having learnt from the past, most players haven’t really hit the ground running. Probably (having Arendse) off the bench suits us better.
“I don’t think Canan has done anything wrong… He’s worked hard, that combination works for us. And as it’s worked out, they’ve put a massive amount of experience on their bench, so – without knowing what they were going to do – we’ve got Bismarck (du Plessis) and Kurt-Lee can come off the bench (who) are relatively experienced, in terms of being a bit older.”
Veteran hooker Du Plessis was brought into the match-23 ahead of youngster Jan-Hendrik Wessels, who has come up with a few impressive cameos off the bench lately.
“I just think this is a game… if you look at their bench, their hooker Sean Cronin has got 206 caps, so it puts things into perspective. (Michael) Ala’alatoa has won Super Rugby with the Crusaders. Who can afford to put (Johnny) Sexton and (Ciaran) Frawley on the bench?” White said.
“So, we are probably going to need as much depth in our bench as possible. With the make-up of our bench, our reserve lock (Janko Swanepoel) and flank (WJ Steenkamp) are relatively young, so to have a bit of a cooler, older head is probably important for us as well.”
Bulls Team
15 Canan Moodie 14 David Kriel 13 Cornal Hendricks 12 Harold Vorster 11 Madosh Tambwe 10 Chris Smith 9 Zak Burger 8 Elrigh Louw 7 Arno Botha 6 Marcell Coetzee (captain) 5 Ruan Nortje 4 Walt Steenkamp 3 Mornay Smith 2 Johan Grobbelaar 1 Gerhard Steenekamp.
Replacements: 16 Bismarck du Plessis 17 Simphiwe Matanzima 18 Robert Hunt 19 Janko Swanepoel 20 WJ Steenkamp 21 Embrose Papier 22 Morné Steyn 23 Kurt-Lee Arendse.