Weekend Argus (Saturday Edition)
Stormers look to dig themselves out URC hole
THE Stormers are confident they can dig themselves out of the United Rugby Championship hole they currently find themselves in.
Only a win will suffice against Leinster today (kicoff 7.05pm) and if they can’t pull that off, it will be a steep hill to get into the play-offs.
The former champions have progressed to the final in both seasons, losing out to Munster last year in their quest to go back-to-back. Now they are in a fight to make the top eight and only wins in their last four games from today will secure that position.
“We’re definitely feeling the pressure. You can say it’s (just) another game, but (for us) it’s not.
“We’ve got ourselves into a hole and we want to get ourselves out of it. We’ve done it before, and we’ll do it again,” Stormers coach John Dobson said yesterday during his team announcement.
“We have a proud record in Cape Town and hosted all six of the URC play-offs we’ve played, but it’s not going to be the same this year.
“We want to make sure we’re part of the Champions Cup and we still want to win the URC. It (the pressure) all started on the tour (their overseas opener early on in the season) and if we had the wins against Cardiff and Benetton, then we wouldn’t be having this discussion now.
“We’ve been sort of catching up the whole season and the Ospreys loss obviously just took it down (up) another notch in terms of the pressure on us.”
Making sure they end up in Europe’s elite club rugby competition begins tonight against the formidable Leinster.
After being too loose against the Ospreys with their attack and ball handling, Dobson confirmed that the Stormers would not change things just because they were a bit wayward.
Players like captain Salmaan
Moerat, flanker Ben-Jason Dixon, centre Damian Willemse, prop Neethling Fouché and hooker Joseph Dweba also return to add grunt to the starting team.
Stalwart prop Brok Harris will play his 150th match for the Cape Town franchise in another first-class record for him, while young loose forwards Evan Roos and Marcel Theunissen will run out for their 50th caps for the former URC champions.
Dobson is certain his team will execute their plans better today.
That is why they won’t change things up.
“We have a game model and we can’t change that just because we feel the pressure. We have to execute it better. I know that is a terrible cliché. We were loose last week and things didn’t stick for us. But a season or two ago, everything stuck.
“We can’t complain about it. We have to be a little more accurate and not change our game model. There was nothing wrong with it, just the execution, so we are not changing to being entirely set-piece based or just maul or trying to become a multi-phase team to win penalties.
“Last week we changed things up in player personnel to find out some things and build depth in case we need the guys later in the tournament. It wasn’t the reason for the loss. But we have now probably gone more to the team we think will do duty (for the rest of the season).
“The box was wrong way.”
Stormers: 15 Warrick Gelant, 14 Suleiman Hartzenberg, 13 Dan du Plessis, 12 Damian Willemse, 11 Ben Loader, 10 Manie Libbok, 9 Herschel Jantjies, 8 Evan Roos, 7 Ben-Jason Dixon, 6 Marcel Theunissen, 5 Ruben van Heerden, 4 Salmaan Moerat (captain), 3 Neethling Fouche, 2 Joseph Dweba, 1 Brok Harris
Bench: Andre-Hugo Venter, 17 Kwenzo Blose, 18 Frans Malherbe, 19 Connor Evans, 20 Willie Engelbrecht, 21 Hacjivah Dayimani, 22 Stefan Ungerer, 23
Wandisile Simelane