URC WRAP: Moving weekend puts Bulls and Sharks in pound seats

In multi-day sporting contests such as golf tournaments or test cricket they talk about a moving day and in a similar vein round 10 of the Vodacom United Rugby Championship season may prove to have been the moving weekend for the South African challenge.

There is still the distortion of two local teams having a game in hand on the overseas teams around them on the log, and the other two having two games in hand.

But realistically, as the halfway point in the league season arrives and is passed, it does appear that the Vodacom Bulls and the Hollywoodbets Sharks have stamped themselves as the realistic challengers for a top two or top four finish.

The DHL Stormers coach John Dobson said it on the eve of his team’s cash with runaway log leaders Leinster - “If we don’t win this game, we are going to struggle to be in contention at the sharp end of the competition”.

Dobson will also know that, given that Leinster were under-strength, his team needed to win in order to confirm themselves as a top side that could mount a realistic title challenge.

FORTHCOMING DERBY WILL DETERMINE A LOT

Theoretically, it can still happen. Most of the Stormers’ games are in South Africa from here, and they do have a good record in their home country. But although Ulster don’t appear to be the team they used to be, their other remaining overseas game is against Scarlets, who aren’t enjoying a good season.

A lot for the Stormers now hinges on them beating the Bulls in the north/south derby that comes up next, on 8 February. It is a game that the Stormers will need to win much more than the Bulls will, for the Bulls are comfortable in their top four challenge after their bonus point derby win away to the Emirates Lions.

If this was a moving weekend, that could be a deciding weekend if the Stormers lose.

A top eight finish, meaning playoff qualification and Investec Champions Cup status for next season, will still remain possible because other teams challenging to be in that bracket, such as Edinburgh, Benetton and Ulster, also tripped up at the weekend. And the Stormers are just a few points behind all of those teams with a game in hand.

BULLS COMFORTABLE IN TOP FOUR

The Bulls are comfortably in the top four, currently holding down third place. When they beat the Lions, second placed Glasgow Warriors had yet to play their game against Connacht, so the Bulls were well in the frame for a top two spot as they had one game in hand on the Glaswegians and trailed by just three.

However, Glasgow snuck across the line in Sunday’s game at the Scotstoun with a winning margin of three points. With Leinster having picked up full points against the Stormers, and Glasgow failing to score four tries, Franco Smith’s team did drop another point in their challenge to the frontrunners. Leinster now lead the log by 11 points.

A top two finish is highly coveted because it means that if all goes your way in the playoffs, you will play your games at home at least until the final. That should be the Bulls’ aim and it is also still a realistic aim for the Sharks. The Durbanites are one point behind the Bulls, in fourth, admittedly with the Pretoria team having a game in hand on them.

So a lot is going to hinge on the upcoming derby phase of the competition. If the Bulls lose to the Stormers, they will be pegged back a bit in their quest for a top two finish, but will still be comfortably in the top four.

Whether or not they stay ahead of the Sharks though will then hinge on how they go in their home derby against John Plumtree’s men, as well as on their return derbies against the Stormers and Lions, while the Sharks have lots to gain by scoring two wins against the Lions.

The Stormers will be back within range of the Sharks if they beat the Bulls and the Sharks don’t, which is possible if you consider the Stormers will be hosting the Bulls while the Sharks will be traveling to Pretoria.

FAILING TO HOLD ON WAS SEVERE SETBACK FOR LIONS

The Lions, like the Stormers, have dropped back in their challenge, and the top four finish they were aiming at when they started off their season so well looks a long way away for them.

That they couldn’t hold out against the Bulls on their home ground after somehow conspiring to lead at halftime when in reality they were mostly the team under pressure was a severe setback for them, just like the Stormers’ inability to capitalise on what Dobson had referred to as an “opportunity” against under-strength Leinster was also a big setback for the Cape team.

They now have eight points separating themselves from the fourth placed Sharks, who won with a bonus point, which is why it is possible to say that the big move has been made. Make no mistake, the Stormers can still make it, but it is catch-up from here when it comes to a top four finish.

While a finish in the top eight is still very much on, but given the way the same old movie seems to keep getting replayed in their overseas games, no-one will be betting on them winning an away playoff game if it is played north of the equator.

The old movie reference channels the way the same things keep appearing to happen to the Stormers, like conceding a try just before halftime that changes the game and puts them on the back foot.

It happened against Leinster, it happened the previous week against Racing 92 in a different competition, it happened against Harlequins in London before Christmas, it happened in the middle stages of the URC loss away to Edinburgh.

STORMERS NEED TO FIX THEIR LINEOUT

The habit of being error ridden, meaning mainly handling errors, was established on the first tour of the season back in October, and while it was a habit they appeared to have kicked when they thrashed Sale Sharks at home, easily their finest performance of the season, it has returned.

So has what initially looked like an aberration against Racing but which started to take on distinct habit proportions against Leinster - making a dogs bollocks of the lineouts. It really doesn’t require a degree in rugby rocket science to figure out why the Stormers lost so comprehensively in a game many thought they might win.

If you can’t win your lineout ball, you can’t build momentum. It also makes it easier for your opponents to devise a strategy around kicking the ball out in your territory, as they are then confident they can win back possession from the lineout.

The Stormers lost lineouts both on attack and defence and again it proved a massive blow to their chances of challenging for a win. When they didn’t overthrow the balls were poached, and even when they won the ball they sometimes lost the ball when trying to set up the maul or knocked it on a few passes later.

There’s a lot of work for the Stormers to do on that aspect of their game before they play the Bulls. They will also be hoping that Manie Libbok will be fit for that game.

Losing the Springbok before halftime when they had no flyhalf, or for that matter reliable place-kicking backup on the bench, was a huge setback and it may not have been a coincidence that the injury coincided with the moment Leinster slipped into over-drive.

NO CHANCE ONCE LIBBOK WENT OFF

The Stormers really had no chance of winning once Libbok went off. You could say that is bad luck, but there is always inherent risk when you go six/two in the bench split between forwards and backs. This was a day when it undeniably backfired and the Stormers unfortunately have no-one to blame for that other than themselves.

It was bad luck to lose Frans Malherbe on the morning of the game to illness. The scrum is a big part of the Stormers’ weaponry and given the callowness of some of the players on the Leinster bench, they would have expected an opportunity to be created there. The bench was the one area where it was clear before the game that the Stormers were considerably more experienced.

But even though so many of us expected the Stormers to do well against what was expected to be an under-strength team, the reality is that there was no lack of experience in the rest of the Leinster team. Seasoned Ireland internationals like Dan Sheehan, James Lowe and others were playing in a quest to pick up needed game time, and then there were the international players they had on their books.

Although Sheehan was the official man of the match, All Black centre Jordie Barrett was the standout in the backs, creating the first two tries before scoring the third himself, while Bok lock RG Snyman revelled in playing against fellow South Africans.

DUBLIN TOLD US WHY SA FAILED IN EUROPE

Which cues what this round of matches told us about the reasons for the tame SA exit from the Champions Cup the week before. It was no coincidence the Sharks were able to recover from their humiliation at the hands of Bordeaux Begles the week before by comprehensively beating Cardiff.

To put it simply, this time they weren’t playing against a big budget Galactico team that can afford to supplement star French internationals like Damian Penaud with other international stars in the way that Leinster are now doing with Barrett and Snyman.

The Sharks have struggled because of injuries but this time they were playing Cardiff, who were without their Wales internationals and thus counter-balancing the Sharks’ injuries, and who also are several levels below the French teams or Leinster when it comes to budget.

The Bulls were able to grab a bonus point win over the Lions and look the best SA bet in the URC, but given that they can’t afford the depth of the top European teams, how significant will be the injuries that were sustained by Elrigh Louw and Ruan Nortje to their challenge.

For the wealthy French sides and even Leinster, losing those two players might not be so significant, but for the Bulls it could be.

Their director of rugby described the win over the Lions as an expensive win, and it may well be, and it is not as if the Bulls didn’t already have enough injuries to contend with this season, something that started when they were playing the Carling Currie Cup when it should have been their pre-season.

They are though currently in a much better place than the other local teams, with the possible exception of the Sharks, who could mount a serious challenge for the URC trophy when, as expected, their injured players all return on one wave.

Weekend Vodacom United Rugby Championship results

Ospreys 43 Benetton 0

Emirates Lions 22 Vodacom Bulls 37

Scarlets 30 Edinburgh 24

Leinster 36 DHL Stormers 12

Cardiff Rugby 22 Hollywoodbets Sharks 42

Dragons 19 Munster 38

Glasgow Warriors 22 Connacht 19

Ulster 14 Zebre 15