Bulls Rugby Director urges Springbok to 'stay away from the buffet'

Bulls director of rugby and former World Cup-winning coach Jake White has fired criticism towards a current Springboks winger.

White, the former Springboks coach from 2004-2007 who won the Rugby World Cup in his final year, spoke about the physical shape that current Bulls winger Canan Moodie is in after returning from their Northern tour.

Moodie only started one Test match on the Springboks end-of-year tour, which came against Scotland at Murrayfield. White seems to have been aggravated that his winger wasn’t released to prepare for the Bulls games earlier, like some other Springboks.

When asked about Moodie’s performance against Connacht on Saturday in Galway, White criticised his winger's physical condition.

“He looked at times like he had eaten too much food at the buffet while he was on tour for the last month. I said that to him. I think he is going to have to start staying away from the buffet,” White said after the game in Galway.

Although the Bulls stormed to a 28-14 victory, White wasn’t pleased with his winger's performance, especially with star Springboks winger Kurt-Lee Arendse on a sabbatical in Japan. 

Moodie’s performance was full of opportunities, and it was clear to see that White was unimpressed with his finishing ability.

“When he got away a couple of times, I thought he would finish but as I said, I think we will have to keep him away from the buffet for a while.” 

Moodie is widely considered a bright future talent who burst onto the Springboks scene two years ago, debuting for the Springboks in 2022 against the Wallabies in Sydney. 

The 22-year-old has struggled with injury in 2024 and has lacked consistent game time for the Springboks this year, with Springboks coach Rassie Erasmus preferring superstar winger Cheslin Kolbe on one wing, and in from Bulls teammate Kurt Lee Arendse on the other wing.

Despite spending time on the sidelines in 2024 due to injury, Moodie has played the first six games of the United Rugby Championship competition for the Jake White led Pretoria outfit.

White once again wasn’t scared of singling out another one of his Bulls players, saying that 20-year-old lock JF van Heerden must improve from the performance against Connacht.

“A guy like JF van Heerden is relatively young still in terms of calling lineouts; he’ll have to learn from that performance.”

White’s comment comes after the Bulls lineout started strongly, but slowly faded towards the end of the game. 

“The lineout got a bit sloppy in the end but I guess that’s what happens, a little bit of fatigue and a little bit of experience to understand that we needed to change things up a bit,” White said.

“I’m very happy, especially the first half; we had 12 lineouts and lost one, and that’s considering we’ve got no Reinhardt Ludwig and Ruan Nortje.”