{"id":215245,"date":"2025-10-15T12:43:09","date_gmt":"2025-10-15T12:43:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/215245\/"},"modified":"2025-10-15T12:43:09","modified_gmt":"2025-10-15T12:43:09","slug":"handre-pollard-flown-home-as-bulls-react-to-loss-with-major-changes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/215245\/","title":{"rendered":"Handre Pollard flown home as Bulls react to loss with major changes"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

mens<\/p>\n

united-rugby-championship<\/p>\n

Handre Pollard of Vodacom Bulls during the United Rugby Championship match between Ulster and Vodacom Bulls at Affidea Stadium in Belfast. (Photo By Ramsey Cardy\/Sportsfile via Getty Images) https:\/\/www.rugbypass.com\/news\/handre-pollard-flown-home-as-bulls-react-to-loss-with-major-changes\/ <\/p>\n

Bulls<\/a> head coach Johan Ackermann<\/a> has retained just five players from the starting XV that lost to Ulster<\/a> on Saturday for their United Rugby Championship<\/a> clash with Connacht<\/a> on Friday in Galway.<\/p>\n

South Africa<\/a> trio, tighthead Wilco Louw<\/a>, lock Cobus Wiese<\/a> and wing Canan Moodie<\/a>, No.8 Jeandre Rudolph<\/a> and wing Sebastian de Klerk are the five players that have been retained, though Moodie has shifted from outside centre to the wing after the 28-7 loss in Belfast.<\/p>\n

Springboks Willie le Roux, Jan Serfontein<\/a> and Jan-Hendrik Wessels<\/a> are just three of the players who will come into the starting XV for the contest with Stuart Lancaster\u2019s side.<\/p>\n

Wessels\u2019 start at hooker has shifted Johan Grobbelaar<\/a> to the bench, meaning the captaincy has been handed to lock Reinhardt Ludwig.<\/p>\n

After starting in the Bulls\u2019 opening two wins of the season before dropping out of the team for Ulster, Keagan Johannes<\/a> will start at fly-half again in place of Handre Pollard<\/a>, who has flown home from the tour for the birth of his second child.<\/p>\n

Fixture<\/p>\n

United Rugby Championship<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Connacht <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Bulls <\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Having picked up maximum points in the opening two rounds against the Ospreys<\/a> and reigning champions Leinster, the Bulls crashed back down to earth at the Affidea Stadium, leaving empty-handed and slipping to sixth place.<\/p>\n

They will look to respond to a Connacht side that are also reeling from a round three defeat to Cardiff.<\/p>\n

Bulls XV
15 Willie le Roux
14 Canan Moodie
13 David Kriel<\/a> (VC)
12 Jan Serfontein
11 Sebastian de Klerk
10 Keagan Johannes
9 Paul de Wet
1 Alu Tshakweni
2 Jan-Hendrik Wessels
3 Wilco Louw
4 Cobus Wiese
5 Reinhardt Ludwig<\/a> (C)
6 Nama Xaba
7 JJ Theron
8 Jeandre Rudolph<\/p>\n

Replacements
16 Johan Grobbelaar
17 Gerhard Steenekamp
18 Francois Klopper
19 Nicolaas Janse van Rensburg
20 Mpilo Gumede
21 Embrose Papier
22 Harold Vorster
23 Stravino Jacobs<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"mens united-rugby-championship Handre Pollard of Vodacom Bulls during the United Rugby Championship match between Ulster and Vodacom Bulls…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":215246,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":["post-215245","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-rugby","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215245","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=215245"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/215245\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/215246"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=215245"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=215245"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=215245"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}