Cornal Hendricks

• Despite only playing one competitive game under his watch to date, Cornal Hendricks has already heaped praise on Bulls director of rugby, Jake White’s for his winning mentality.
• The 32-year-old stalwart says the former Bok coach is a “very intelligent, smart” operator.
• Hendricks warns that the Bulls haven’t overplayed their hand already with a fine performance at Super Fan Saturday as they lie in wait for Griquas this weekend.

A pedigree has its perks, just ask Jake White.

Despite the Bulls having only played a single pre-season fixture under his guidance to date, he’s already being heaped with praise for his “winning mindset”.

Cornal Hendricks, who’s increasingly looking like a key member in the World Cup-winning former Springbok coach’s plan to kickstart his tenure, has enjoyed him in particular.

“It’s a great honour and privilege to work with him,” said the 32-year-old stalwart.

“He’s an intelligent coach, very smart. What I enjoy is that he has a lot of different coaching styles. He wants you to feel comfortable in whatever position you play. He’s really done us as players a world of good at a time like this.

“There were some tough times in the previous few years but Jake and his whole coaching staff have brought a winning mindset and the way we’ve been training has been great. He’s making us better as individuals and as a team.”

To be honest, the men from Loftus didn’t do themselves much of a favour in terms of avoiding high expectations with a magnificent 49-28 victory over the Sharks at Super Fan Saturday at Loftus a fortnight ago, a clinical performance that showed little to no signs of rustiness.

It’s even led to suggestions that the Bulls might’ve already overplayed their hand ahead of Super Rugby Unlocked’s start this weekend.

But Hendricks has issued a stark warning.

READ | ‘Newborn’ Cornal Hendricks is going to play it as he sees it at inside centre

“There are a lot of things we actually haven’t done yet,” he said.

“We’re obviously very happy with the way we played against the Sharks but we just want to continue playing good rugby.”

That will have Griquas, the Bulls opponents at Loftus on Saturday night, firmly on their toes though the Peacock Blues themselves are an unknown factor having only played two warm-ups against the Cheetahs in the last two weeks under new coach Scott Mathie.

They also have the motivation of handing the hosts a 37-15 drubbing in last year’s Currie Cup in their own backyard.

“We’re preparing for every match with the same attitude,” said Hendricks.

“Griquas will be coming to Pretoria to prove a point again, I have no doubt. But we prepare the same every week whether we’re playing the Sharks, Lions, Cheetahs or Griquas. We’re quite happy with the way we played against the Sharks, we learnt a lot from that game and we did a lot of things right.”