Vodacom Bulls flank Arno Botha will resume training next week after recovering from a pectoral muscle tear.

The Bulls have a bye next weekend, so Botha should make his return against the Force at Loftus on 21 March.

However, flyhalf Jacques-Louis Potgieter could be on the sidelines for another week.

According to Bulls team doctor Org Strauss, Botha will train on Monday and Potgieter, who picked up a hamstring injury last week, will be assessed then. Potgieter was a late withdrawal from the Bulls team that beat the Sharks and could be out of action for two weeks.

No one picked up any injuries in that win, although Francois Hougaard, Deon Stegmann and Lappies Labuschagne will only train on Tuesday, due to light niggles.

Duncan Matthews was less fortunate, though. The outside back tore his ACL playing for Tuks in the Varsity Cup and will be sidelined till at least September.

He joins Flip van der Merwe (pectoral, April), William Small-Smith (foot, two months), Pierre Schoeman (ACL knee, July), Bandise Maku (pectoral, August), Werner Kruger (ankle, 10 weeks), Carlo Engelbrecht (ankle, 10 weeks) and Burger Odendaal (knee, three weeks) on the injury list.

Photo: Lee Warren/Gallo Images