KEY POINTS:
The Hurricanes were squashed by a bulldozing Sharks forward pack, who rolled their team to the top of rugby's Super 14 with a 27-14 win in Durban this morning (NZ time).
The unbeaten Sharks won their sixth match and picked up their first bonus point of the season for scoring four tries while they restricted the Hurricanes to just one consolation try in the final quarter.
Three of the hosts' tries came from rolling mauls established near the Hurricanes' tryline, summing up the dominance of their pack led superbly by veteran flanker AJ Venter.
The Sharks also played with an adventurous spirit which is normally the domain of the Hurricanes, with fullback Francois Steyn, winger JP Pietersen and halfback Ruan Pienaar at the heart of several counter-attacks.
In contrast, the Hurricanes, who lost their third consecutive game, struggled to claim quality ball and were beset by mistakes.
Captain Tana Umaga described the result as "very disappointing".
"The Sharks were too good today but I don't think we helped ourselves with the amount of errors we made," he said.
"We've got to look at our own game but that's to take nothing away from the Sharks.
"It showed the difference between the sides. They were a side playing with confidence compared to a side that was a little bit indifferent."
Umaga was unlucky to be sinbinned in the 15th minute when he took out Steyn while contesting a high ball - an incident that appeared accidental.
The Hurricanes did well not to concede any points while the skipper was off and would have felt confident when they trailed just 9-10 at halftime - three penalties to first five-eighth Blair Stewart nearly matching unconverted tries to Pietersen and lock Johan Ackermann.
However, the Sharks took control of the game in the 10 minutes after halftime, opting against taking penalty kicks at goal to set up lineout drives.
It worked twice, resulting in tries to loose forwards Jacques Botes and Warren Britz.
First five-eighth Butch James landed a penalty before the Hurricanes scored their only try with 15 minutes. A neat lineout move involving reserve hooker Mahonri Schwalger saw prop Anthony Perenise cross on his first Super 14 start.
Next week against the Lions in Johannesburg, the Hurricanes will get the much-needed services of their six All Blacks who have been on reconditioning programmes.
Captain Venter's team will seek a seventh-straight win against the ACT Brumbies at home next weekend.
"We've got six in a row now but it's still only a start, we've got a lot of games on the road to come," Venter said.
"We've been looking for the four tries all season and eventually it's come today so we're happy with that."
- NZPA
