30/01/2008 11:36

Durban - Frederic Michalak has been thrown straight into the action in the Sharks' first pre-season match, with Dick Muir naming the French international to start at flyhalf against the Cheetahs in Friday night's warm-up game in Bloemfontein.

Kick-off is at 19:00.

According to Michael Marnewick, writing on the Sharks website, a 26-man squad will play the Cheetahs over four 'chukkas' with 11 reserves which will afford every player an opportunity to get game time.

"We have a couple of niggles and won't risk any guys in a warm-up game, so the team has been chosen from the players that are 100% fit," confirmed Muir.

"We would like to have left all our Springboks behind to do some extra conditioning but it didn't pan out that way. We are hoping to see that some of the work we have been doing has paid off and we want to see the net effect of the new laws. Obviously we have practiced them but haven't played them and we need to see from an attack and defense perspective what a difference it has made."

He explained that this match afforded the coaching staff the opportunity to see everybody's form but confirmed that anyone can play their way into the team for the Super 14.

"Yes, absolutely, it is wide open. We know it's a long campaign and we will select the players that are on form."

He said of the Cheetahs that, "they have a really nice, balanced side, pretty much a side that has played a lot together so we would imagine they would be slightly better organised then us. But there is no substitute for enthusiasm and the guys are really itching to go after all the hard work that they have put in."

Muir admitted that in a match like this, the result is not at all relevant. "No warm-up games are result-driven, I don't even know if there will be kicking for posts," he admitted. "We believe that if we play a certain way, we will win, so if we play correctly, the result will look after itself."

When the Sharks take on the Lions in the second warm-up match on February 6 in Durban, Muir says he'd like to see a steady improvement from the game on Friday night.

He also admitted that the team to play the Lions will be as close as possible to the team to take on Western Force in the opening match of the Super 14.

"There are certain people that select themselves, and there are certain positions open, so we want to make sure that everyone goes into the campaign having had a certain amount of game time."

With only two warm-up matches, and the probability that no players will have much more than 80 minutes of pre-season rugby behind them, is this enough game time going into the Super 14?

"Absolutely," Muir said. "We would prefer to be underdone than overdone. Last year we only played one game, and this year a lot of our conditioning has been of a physical nature, so this won't be the first physical contact the players would have had."

Sharks:

15. Stefan Terblanche
14. Frank Wagenstroom
13. Waylon Murray
12. Andries Strauss
11. Henno Mentz
10. Frederic Michalak
9. Charl Macleod
8. Jean Deysel
7. AJ Venter (Capt)
6. Keegan Daniel
5. Albert van den Berg
4. Johan Snyman
3. Beast Mtawarira
2. Skipper Badenhorst
1. BJ Botha

Reserves:

16. Kees Lensing
17. Jody Jenneker
18. Robbie Harris
19. Alistair Hargreaves
20. Johann Muller
21. Jacques Botes
22. Nikolai Blignaut
23. Ruan Pienaar
24. Francois Steyn
25. Adi Jacobs
26. Dumisane Matyeshana