Eloff: 'Bravery wasn't enough'

Brave Lions coach Eugene Eloff

Lions coach Eugene Eloff said that he is proud of his side, after they lost 18-20 to the Free State Cheetahs in the Absa Currie Cup Final in Bloemfontein on Saturday.

He praised his team for having "put up a brave performance".

The Cheetahs came back from a 12-point deficit (6-18) to beat the Lions and retain the Currie Cup title - becoming the domestic competition champions for the third year in a row.

"Unfortunately brave just isn't good enough," Eloff said.

"When you're ahead 18-6 you really should knock the opposition out of the game. However, I would like to compliment my team on one hell of an effort, we played to the death and in the end it just didn't go our way.

"I thought the Cheetahs showed a lot of character to come back like that," he added.

Eloff said that despite the side being behind by three points at half-time, he had been proud of their efforts in the first 40 minutes and believed that they had started to take control of the game.

"At half-time I told the guys that we had gotten a measure of control and we needed to expose them more," he said.

"One or two bounces could have gone our way, but really let's take nothing from the Cheetahs. They were excellent."

Lions captain Ernst Joubert was as complimentary as his coach.

"I would like to thank Rory and his side," he said.

"They had a brilliant season and are the well deserved winners tonight. Well done guys!"

Eloff also said that he had always believed that his side would make it through to the Final.

"I'm an optimist," he said.

"I believed at the beginning of the year that we could do it. I believe in this bunch of youngsters and this is one step closer to us becoming a great side again.

"We'll be a bit down tonight and we'll talk about the game, but we'll get positive and we'll be back next year."