Emirates Lions head coach Van Rooyen said the Vodacom Bulls' experience, and their number of caps, were the difference between winning and losing on Saturday in their Round 10 Investec Champions Cup match.
"It's obviously difficult to speed up the learning. I think the Bulls' total caps today were about 205. Bringing Willie off the bench, you could see the difference he made," van Rooyen said.
"Canan also made a big difference. So sticking to what we want to do, making sure that everyone is allowed in what we want to do. Some parts of the plan were executed really well today, however, some parts of it were not executed once."
"That's the only way, you can't buy experience if that makes sense."
The loss meant the Lions are almost certainly out of the Top 8 and a spot in the playoffs. Relegating to play in the EPCR Challenge Cup in the 2025/26 season.
"Obviously that is a little disappointing," Van Rooyen said.
"At one stage in the second half, we felt we managed to turn the momentum. We were on a score, we were ahead, and then frustrating errors were made by us."
"I think we stopped for a moment when we thought the ball was going to be out directly, and then kind of tapped it in. That put us under pressure to try and play a little bit differently. We were not good enough at some stages."
"I think the difference in how they wanted to play is probably bigger than what we wanted to play."
"At stages, we allowed them to play their way, and if you're going to give their big bodies momentum they are tough to stop. At some stages, we managed to play the way that we wanted to play, and we could feel that that put them under stress. So I think it's almost more getting them out of how they want to play instead of us changing that much."