Esterhuizen the enforcer Sharks need now

Andre Esterhuizen’s 100th match arrives at the moment the Sharks need a giant performance most, writes MARK KEOHANE.

Writing for TimesLIVE, Keohane argues that Esterhuizen has become the prototype for the Springboks’ new hybrid era: a midfielder enforcer with the body of a blindside flanker and the presence of a tighthead. Rassie Erasmus didn’t just talk about versatility, he used Esterhuizen at flank in Test rugby, where the big man “never blinked, but he did growl and roar”.

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Keohane says Esterhuizen embraced the role because he was “too valuable, too uniquely built and too brutally effective” to stay confined to No 12 – and his recent Test impact has proved Erasmus right. Now, 100 caps into his Sharks career, he remains the outlier: the one big-money player who has consistently delivered.

Saturday’s clash with Saracens is the perfect stage. Esterhuizen understands the physicality and intelligence of Premiership rugby, and Keohane stresses that the Sharks need his certainty and leadership “because this is a team that has spent too much time flattering to deceive”.

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The Investec Champions Cup is confrontational, which suits Esterhuizen’s power game, and Keohane believes the Sharks’ hopes hinge on their centurion: “Andre the Giant will smash into the challenge,” he writes, adding that a reset in identity starts with him.

Whatever the result, it will be a celebration of a rare player – but for the Sharks, Keohane insists, it also has to be the beginning of something better.

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