Do the Stormers really need Vermeulen to beat the toothless Lions?
THE Stormers are at the top of the Super Rugby heap and, even though the rising sun has barely cleared the horizon of the 2015 season, a hot start bodes well for Cape rugby fans.
Two long and laborious seasons of losing followed the heady days of 2012, when the Stormers dominated the league phase of the competition.
By beginning this year with successive wins – first against the Bulls and, on Saturday, the Blues – the current crop of Stormers will either become the sixth in team history to use the springboard to leap into the knockout rounds, or the first to trip over it and crash out of play-off contention.
“Did we need the bonus point?” coach Allister Coetzee asked when told that the Stormers’ 27-16 victory against the Blues had ensured they would finish round two in first place on the overall standings.
The answer is no, the Stormers don’t have any bonus points. The Brumbies and Sharks, who lead the competition in try-scoring, each have two bonus points. But what those two sides don’t have is an unbeaten record, like the log-leading Stormers.
“Like we said at the beginning of the season, we just want to play winning rugby,” said Stormers captain Duane Vermeulen, who had to answer for pointing to the uprights in the final quarter instead of chasing the four-try cherry. “It doesn’t matter how we get there, if we win that’s a positive. It’s good for team morale.”
As John Kirwan, coach of the winless Blues, said on Saturday night, “this competition is about momentum, and we don’t have any”.
“To get a win against the Bulls and then grind out the win today is a great way for the Stormers to start,” added Kirwan. “They’ll be a hard team to knock over, they have a nice balance of young guys who keep the enthu- siasm there.”
The Blues gave it a full go on Saturday. Lock Hayden Triggs will probably be off sightseeing for the next couple of weeks after knocking Vermeulen over with a right hook, while a broken leg has more than likely brought a premature end to hardman Rynhardt Elstadt’s season and, based on links to a Japanese club, possibly his Stormers career.
Schalk Burger is expected to be headed in the opposite direction after Suntory Sungoliath’s season comes to an end next week in the All-Japan Championship final. Between now and then, Coetzee will have to fill the gap in the back row.
The Stormers coach might also consider taking the gap to give Vermeulen the first of four mandatory games off, in lieu of the Springboks’ preparation plan for the World Cup.
Next on the Stormers menu is a Lions main course to be served at Ellis Park on Saturday (kick-off 7.10pm).
Coach Johan Ackermann is a fervent proponent of running rugby, and the Lions are in last place after being blown away by the Hurricanes and then sunk by the Sharks at a drenched Kings Park.
Western Province beat the core of this Lions side in last year’s Currie Cup final. Vermeulen was on Bok duty and played no part in that match. The same goes for Jean de Villiers, Damian de Allende and Eben Etzebeth, while injuries saw Siya Kolisi and Frans Malherbe miss the decider.
De Villiers is recovering from a serious knee injury and won’t do time with the Stormers this year, but De Allende is on form, and Etzebeth, Kolisi, Malherbe and Argentine lock Manuel Carizza are available this week.
The point is that Coetzee is able to field a significantly stronger team than the one that clinched the domestic trophy.
Now might be as good an opportunity as the coach gets to entrust the No 6 jersey to Kolisi, the No 8 jersey to Nizaam Carr, pictured left, and the captain’s armband to Juan de Jongh. Like Kirwan, Coetzee is a big believer in momentum, and question marks about Carr and Kolisi’s match fitness are warranted.
But Vermeulen will be far more valuable to a young Stormers contingent, as a player and a leader, in matches against foreign opponents than for a sparring session with a Lions outfit they know all too well.