David Lyons is set to return to the Waratahs’s 22-man squad for the clash with the Blues in Sydney on Saturday night.
The 27-year-old suffered a broken leg last September, which ended his World Cup campaign, but he showed no ill-effects after playing 30 minutes for club-side Sydney University on Saturday.
Despite not playing a lot of rugby, coach Ewen McKenzie is keen to add experience to his team ahead of Saturday’s blockbuster.
If he does play, the back-rower will become just the third New South Wales player to reach 100 games, joining former team-mates Chris Whitaker (118) and Matthew Burke (115).
"He hasn’t played a lot of footy but we’ll definitely consider him as an option at least coming into the 22," coach Ewen McKenzie said of Lyons’ selection hopes on Monday.
"Obviously he’s a very experienced player with 99 state caps so that is something to consider."
McKenzie also wouldn’t rule out further changes to the line-up after only scraping home against the winless Cheetahs last week.
Despite the Bulls sitting in third place, McKenzie doesn’t believe his side deserves the underdog’s tag and is predicting an even contest.
"We’re travelling alright," he said.
"They’ve lost a couple of games and so have we – they’ve played an extra game but I don’t think we’re tracking any better or worse.
"You look at the results over the weekend and any team can win on any weekend. We’re playing at home and it’s been a good venue for us this year so we look forward to the game."
Asked if a tight game-plan is the answer to containing the dangerous Blues backline McKenzie said: "Certainly parts of the game need to be tight.
"I think discipline might be a slightly better word, it doesn’t mean you’re not going to use the ball but I do think you need to play with discipline.
"We’ve got to be better with our ball control so in terms of discipline we need to control the ball better than we did last week. But that doesn’t mean we can’t express ourselves either."
