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The Bulls Head Coach Johan Ackermann.
The newly appointed head coach of the Bulls, Johan Ackermann, has finally been introduced as the new head coach at Loftus Versfeld.
Ackermann replaces 2007 World Cup-winning coach Jake White, whose contract was cut short earlier this month — ahead of the start of this year’s edition of the Currie Cup.
Fresh from the Junior Boks’ victory over the Baby All-Blacks in the Under 20 World Rugby Championship in Italy last weekend, Ackermann has spent the last few days finding his feet at Loftus Versfeld, meeting the players and the backroom staff.
The former Springbok lock believes that establishing team values and the brand of rugby that they want to play will be crucial to build on the team’s success.
“We all agree that this is our values and we have to world together from now on then hopefully no one goes against those values otherwise hopefully the group will push you outside the group if you don’t live those values if we are going to establish the culture we going to have then hopefully I won’t have that problem because I will have an open door policy where you can come a speak why are you not performing what am I doing wrong as a coach and how do we get a middle ground so we don’t get to a position where players have to be unhappy, integrity is questioned or trust is questioned because we didn’t live to our values that’s get broken,” says Ackermann.
Much like Springbok coach Rassie Erasmus’ ethos, Ackermann, who’s previously coached the Lions locally and overseas in England and Japan, is adamant that the team should always be put first. And he will look to cultivate a culture of respect and trust.
“I want a team that works hard so if you not willing to work hard it’s going to be a problem I want a team that is a serving team it’s not about you but about how you can serve the team, the team first is always important it’s about picking something lying around giving water before you drink water caring for your teammate around you and to treat you get every day, the opportunity to treat people how do you treat, we need to have that respect and trust for each other,” Ackermann explains.
The Bulls kick off their Currie Cup campaign against Western Province at the Cape Town Stadium on Saturday evening.
