In the past there might have been an emphasis for the Hollywoodbets Sharks when visiting Cape Town on stopping the DHL Stormers’ backs, but times have changed during the period that the Cape franchise have had the better of Vodacom URC derbies on their home field.
The games have always been close but it is the Stormers who hold a handsome 4-0 lead when it comes to the coastal derbies played at the DHL Stadium (they are also ahead in the Durban games with two wins, one defeat and a draw) and the last time the two sides met last New Year it was the Stormers’ forwards that won it for their team by grinding down the opposition unit.
Even in the game a month before that at Hollywoodbets Kings Park, when the Sharks scored their first ever URC win over the Sharks after a late Manie Libbok winning try for the visitors was chalked off by the VAR, it was the Stormers who were the more dominant of the two packs.
It is is hard to fathom why that is as the Sharks in the past have had more incumbent Springboks, but perhaps it comes down to work-rate - the Stormers forwards do tend to put in a more energetic shift than many of the teams they play against, and that has often been the case against the Durbanites.
If anything, the Stormers’ forward play has grown since last the two teams met, and it was the Stormers’ depth on the bench that enabled them to wear down the Vodacom Bulls in the big derby match played in Cape Town at the start of January.
The Stormers won the game with a driving maul try, and the quality of their driving maul has been one of the big reasons they have gone from battling for a top eight place this time last year to now being comfortably ensconced in the upper reaches of the log and currently hold down pole position.
BONGI CONFIDENT SHARKS CAN MATCH FIRE WITH FIRE
The Sharks’ experienced Bok hooker Bongi Mbonambi, who himself was a Stormer for many seasons, has noted the massive improvement made by the Stormers in that aspect of their game but is hopeful his team will be able to match it when the two teams clash on Saturday night (7:30pm CAT).
“I think the whole of SA knows how well the Stormers have been mauling, and it hasn’t just been this season,” said Mbonambi during a break in his team’s preparation for Saturday’s match.
“Their maul is a big weapon for them, they have really weaponised their maul, so we must get the detail right in order to combat that threat in Saturday’s game. We have watched the video clips, we know they have that weapon. But we also have a strong mauling weapon and it boils down in the end to who wants it more. It will be a good old fashioned derby between two quality teams.”
The team “who wants it more” should really on this occasion be the Sharks, who come to Cape Town 14th on the log and five points behind eighth-placed Benetton on the log.
The Sharks can’t waste any more time getting some winning momentum and really need to win both games against the Stormers, with the return game scheduled for Durban a week later, in order to get properly into the URC race.
BIG NAMES BACK IN TRAINING FOR SHARKS - BUT WILL THEY PLAY?
It appears the Sharks have put a lot into these two games, with according to Mbonambi some of the top players who sat out the two Investec Champions Cup games against Sale Sharks and Clermont-Auvergne coming back into camp on Monday after a brief rest period following the home URC defeat to the Lions at the beginning of January.
Time will tell whether that works for or against the Sharks, noting of course that the Stormers are also hoping to have a few players back who have not seen action since the Bulls derby at the start of January or even before that.
There is a chance some of the Sharks stars might be saved for the Durban game and some of the combinations that did well against Clermont-Auvergne fronting again this week.
The Sharks may feel more confident in being able to do that as the two Champions Cup games, although the one in Manchester ended in defeat, showed signs of an improvement in the squad depth available to new coach JP Pietersen.
“A lot of the guys came back on Monday. Coach JP is trying to build some squad depth so that we can compete across two competitions as all the players can’t play in all the games,” said the double World Cup winning hooker.
“We want to perform in the big games so we need everyone to get game time. It is up to coach JP what side he picks.”
There’s just a hint of a suggestion there that some of the players who have just returned will be bled back in with the intention of being full muster in time for the return derby in Durban on 31 January, and it might not be a bad idea for the Sharks to load their bench given that the Stormers’ bench has been one of the Cape side’s biggest weapons this season.
They haven’t had the supersonic bench in the last two games against Harlequins and Leicester Tigers and it has contributed to them looking a little under-powered but Stormers coach John Dobson is expecting the likes of Adre Smith, who is pivotal to the Stormers second half gear shifts that have started to become commonplace, to be back in the selection mix this week.