John Mitchell has named an unchanged starting lineup for the Blue Bulls’ match against the Free State Cheetahs in Bloemfontein on Friday.

Mitchell has opted to field the same side that suffered an agonising 46-45 loss against Western Province at Loftus last Sunday.

There is one change to the bench, where prop Matthys Basson replaces Dayan van der Westhuizen.

‘We are starting to find our feet now and this [unchanged team] will help,’ Mitchell said. ‘I thought we were desperately unlucky not to get the result against a very strong WP side last weekend, but the challenge will be for us to regroup and make sure our confidence levels are up for the Bloemfontein clash.

‘It is an important match for us, as we need to show more improvement and progress. The hard work is slowly paying off and now the processes and results must start coming together.’

Blue Bulls – 15 Warrick Gelant, 14 Duncan Matthews, 13 Burger Odendaal (c), 12 JT Jackson, 11 Johnny Kotze, 10 Marnitz Boshoff, 9 Ivan van Zyl, 8 Nic de Jager, 7 Tim Agaba, 6 Marco van Staden, 5 Aston Fortuin, 4 Ruben van Heerden, 3 Conraad van Vuuren, 2 Edgar Marutlulle,  1 Pierre Schoeman.
Subs: 16 Johan Grobbelaar, 17 Matthys Basson, 18 Jano Venter, 19 Boom Prinsloo, 20 Piet van Zyl, 21 Tony Jantjies, 22 Ulrich Beyers.

Photo: www.thebulls.co.za