Vodacom Bulls Director of Rugby Jake White complained about SARU's lack of travel arrangements at the postmatch conference after their win over Lyon on Saturday.
Yesterday his worst fears were confirmed as the Vodacom Bulls squad will travel to Northampton on eight different airlines and destinations confirmed.
“We leave tonight. On eight different flights. It’s not ideal. Let’s be fair."
“I’ve said it before that if you are in a high-performance sport and you want to be competitive, there aren’t many sporting teams that would leave on eight different airlines on a Tuesday evening to play a Saturday night game."
“So for whatever reason, I’m sure that the powers that be will sort it out, however, it isn’t what was expected. We were sold it’s an overnight flight and that’s why we are playing in Europe."
“Two weeks ago we went to Leinster, it took us 28 hours to get there and 27 hours to get back."
“Whether we like it or not, it comes at a cost. It comes at a cost, whether we fly business class or not, and we are very fortunate, our board pays for our starting team to fly business class, which is a fantastic gesture on their behalf, and it is a bonus.
“But no sporting team flies 28 hours and no sporting team today, as we speak, flies on eight different airplanes, some to Birmingham, some to London, some land at nine, some land at two.”
“And I’m not going to stop saying. If we want to be the best we need to get those things right. When you are talking about a competition that you want to win, talking about a competition where you want to be the best in the world then the one doesn’t add to the other one."
“Logistically we have to make sure everyone gets fetched and carried in shuttles and then hopefully we will arrive in Northampton by tomorrow lunchtime and everyone should be in the hotel.
“We leave on Tuesday night. In an ideal world I would love to have left on Wednesday and landed on Thursday and prepped here on Monday, Tuesday and Wednesday,” White said.
“When you leave here on Tuesday, guys are sore on Monday after a really tough game against Lyon. Now leaving on Tuesday, which gives you limited time. Monday they’re a bit sore, Tuesday you try to do as much prep as you can, you’re going to get there Thursday, and you can’t have two teams training against each other because you don’t have enough players to tour. All those factors are important things.”