“The Loss Made The Road A Bit More Difficult” – Hawies Fourie

 

The Toyota Cheetahs need a win to secure a place in the playoffs when they visit Stade Charles Mathon in a Challenge Cup Round Four crunch match with Oyonnax.

In Pool A the Hollywoodbets Sharks require only a point from their trip to Dragons RFC on Sunday to seal their passage to the Round of 16 and a home tie, while Dragons will join them with a win. A defeat would end the Welsh region’s hopes unless they can grab a full suite of bonus points.

Section Paloise v Zebre Parma at Stade du Hameau on Saturday is a straight winner-takes-all playoff, although again if the losers can grab bonus points while Toyota Cheetahs lose without any at Oyonnax Rugby, who are out, both could qualify.

Toyota Cheetahs head coach Hawies Fourie refused to blame the weather for their disappointing 22-30 loss to Section Paloise. However, he was confident they could have won the game if they were more clinical and had used their opportunities.

“It (the weather) is not easy, but it is not an excuse,” Fourie said.

“In the second half we created opportunities, but the last pass on two occasions let us down and there were a few wrong decisions.”

“The loss made the road a bit more difficult for ourselves to get where we want to be. However, we are still in it and the game against Oyonnax now becomes a bit more important for us."

“We have to fix what went wrong, we have enough time to fix it and ensure our focus does not let us down again.”