The Bulls host English side Bristol Bears in Pretoria on Saturday before a trip to French side Pau on January 16.
Both will be considerable challenges, bit Ackerman’s side at least showed plenty of fight in their narrows 13-8 loss to the Stormers in the United Rugby Championship this past Saturday.
They need the victories too after losing their first two games in the Champions Cup to Bordeaux and Northampton Saints.
“We’re going full out with the strongest possible team for the next two games,” Ackermann said. “If we lose, we’re out. If we win, we’re in the playoffs). This next block is about getting everyone on the same page, building cohesion and turning our season around.
“We just have to keep going at it. There are a lot of positives we could take out of the (Stormers) match and if we can replicate the performance and fix the mistakes, we can probably turn our season around. How we played (in Cape Town) will definitely give us confidence heading into the European games.
“We know it won’t be easy. Every team is good; we saw the Lions and their result (against the Sharks). We are going to try and get this group as tight as possible and play them together as much as we can.”
The Bulls have somewhat controversially called in help from SA Rugby for their coaching group and will work with several members of the Springbok technical team to try and turn their fortunes around.
