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Pretoria - The Blue Bulls have made two changes to the side which lost to the Sharks last weekend, for their Currie Cup clash against the Cheetahs in Bloemfontein on Saturday.
Coach Pine Pienaar made one positional change on Wednesday, with Zane Kirchner moving from centre to his more accustomed position of fullback.
Francois Venter was promoted to the starting line-up at inside centre for Jurgen Visser who dropped to the bench.
"Francois Venter did well against the Sharks. He created a lot of momentum," said Pienaar.
"He only got 18 minutes but I thought he played pretty well.
"He's a young guy and he's one for the future."
Pienaar said he was backing Venter at number 12, with Wynand Olivier at 13, and Kirchner would be shifted to the last line of defence, where he was most comfortable.
The Bulls did not concede many penalties against the Sharks and Pienaar said it was not an area of concern for the side.
"If you have a look we conceded 12 penalties and the Sharks conceded 18.
"If you then take a look at all the penalties the guys normally concede, the average is around 12 or 14 per game.
"So I think it was more a matter of where we conceded those penalties, that I thought was silly.
"I've said to the guys, you go into a game and you have to adapt as quickly as you can to the ref, and if you can't do that you know you're going to be in a for a bit of trouble for the game."
In their last match, the Bulls were 9-0 down after 10 minutes, with Meyer Bosman kicking three long penalties.
"It put us under pressure, and from there on we chased the game, and if you chase the game you're going to make mistakes," Peinaar said.
With the Bulls languishing in sixth position on the log, after suffering their fourth loss of the season against the Sharks, captain Gary Botha said the side needed to return to their winning ways.
"Hopefully, we will try and get our momentum back," said Botha.
"We're looking for consistency. It's always tough going down to Bloemfontein, like it is playing away against any big union.
"We're going to concentrate on what we're doing, and sort out our errors which we've made in the past couple of matches."
Teams
Blue Bulls: 15 Zane Kirchner, 14 Akona Ndungane, 13 Wynand Olivier, 12 Francois Venter, 11 Bjorn Basson, 10 Louis Fouch, 9 Jano Vermaak, 8 CJ Stander, 7 Dewald Potgieter, 6 Warwick Tecklenburg, 5 Juandre Kruger, 4 Flip van der Merwe, 3 Werner Kruger, 2 Gary Botha (captain), 1 Dean Greyling
Substitutes: 16 Willie Wepener, 17 Rossouw de Klerk, 18 Gerrit-Jan van Velze, 19 Arno Botha, 20 Dustin Jinka, 21 Francois Brummer, 22 Jurgen Visser
Free State Cheetahs: 15 Hennie Daniller, 14 Riaan Smit, 13 Robert Ebersohn, 12 Philip Snyman,
11 Cameron Jacobs, 10 Johan Goosen, 9 Piet van Zyl, 8 Ashley Johnson, 7
Philip van der Walt, 6 Pieter Labuschagne, 5 Izak van der Westhuizen, 4
Francois Uys, 3 Coenie Oosthuizen, 2 Adriaan Strauss (captain), 1
Marcel van der Merwe
