When your team does particularly well the way it is sometimes described as a performance for the ages but you’d have to look for something that describes the opposite after the DHL Stormers produced a lineout performance so poor it beggared belief at the Hive Stadium in Edinburgh on Friday night.
It might seem unkind to not give Edinburgh some credit for their hard fought 17-13 win in the second Vodacom URC match of the season as they maintained their unbeaten record against the Cape side at home. Indeed, the Stormers still have to win on Scottish soil, with the closest they’ve ever come to winning north of the English border being their draw in their first ever visit to Edinburgh in 2022.
But no, sorry Edinburgh, there’s nothing unkind about pinpointing the Stormers’ lineout woes, which were so indescribably lamentably poor that the right words just can’t be found. The Stormers played the role of Father Christmas the previous week but eventually recovered to come through with a good win against Connacht, but this time the gift wrapped present that was handed over to their opponents was not returned.
TRICKY WIND CAN EXPLAIN SOME OF IT BUT NOT ALL
Maybe it was the strong wind that the commentators spoke so much about that was to blame, but after the first choice Stormers hooker Andre-Hugo Venter went off and Vernon Paulo came on the lineout was nothing short of shambolic. The Stormers always appeared to have the physical advantage, but there were six lineouts that went against the throw in the first half alone.
It appeared that they’d established a measure of stability immediately after halftime, when apparently the wind did die down a bit, but as the half wore on the errors returned. Let’s not blame Paulo, who is new to the Stormers set-up, for everything. Sometimes it looked like the communication was just all over the place, with balls going long when it looked like the Stormers jumpers were shaping to take it short.
It was the lineouts that robbed the Stormers of the opportunity to build momentum and to put their formidable drive into effect against a pack that looked vulnerable. As always the Stormers won the scrum battle hands down, but they could only occasionally supplement that with the kind of impact on the drive that they managed in Galway.
EDINBURGH PRESENTED A LAST CHANCE THAT WASN’T TAKEN
Of course if you don’t win the ball you can’t drive and maybe Stormers fullback Warrick Gelant knew a thing or two when in the closing minutes he kicked the ball out inside the Edinburgh 22 when his team was chasing the game and really should have been keeping ball in hand. As it turned out, Edinburgh made an error of their own by kicking out of the 22 rather than keeping the ball in hand to wind down the clock, and they conceded a penalty that gave the Stormers, trailing by four points, one further opportunity to win the game.
Flyhalf Yaqeen Ahmed duly kicked it out for an attacking lineout. This time the jumper was found but it was untidy ball, not for the first time in the game either, and Edinburgh came through to gain possession and secure the win. Maybe it was fitting it ended that way, for this was one game where the entire story really was about the lineout.
DID WELL TO TRAIL BY THREE PLAYING INTO STRONG WIND
The Stormers did well to only trail by three points at halftime given the strong wind they were playing into. Their defence was physical and strong, and they carried well when they had the ball, the only problem was that they couldn’t get the ball to maintain any kind of pressure because hey couldn’t win their own lineouts.
Edinburgh may have been a bit unlucky to be denied a try late in the half due to a double movement adjudged by the referee, and the Stormers should have felt that with the wind at their backs after halftime it was their advantage even though they trailed to an early James Grayson penalty.
Sure enough the Stormers dominated territory early in the half and Ahmed, who missed an easy kick into the wind in the first half, kicked two penalties to give his team a 6-3 lead after 51 minutes. It looked at that stage like the Stormers were taking control of the game but guess what happened next - there was another truly awful lineout throw that fell into Edinburgh hands and Edinburgh used it to build up for the try to replacement prop Paul Hill in the 59th minute that regained the home team the lead.
It looked suspiciously like there may have been a knock in the buildup but the Stormers only had themselves to blame for giving Edinburgh another gilt edged opportunity and Seabelo Senatla was carded to boot for a cynical infringement. It was redressed to 14 against 14 when Senatla was followed to the bin a few minutes later by Freddie Douglas, who paid for the countless warnings that had been issued to his team on a night where Edinburgh did concede a lot of penalties.
NO SURPRISE VISITORS’ TRY CAME OFF A SCRUM
The Stormers scrum was dominant throughout and it was no surprise when man of the match Hacjivah Dayimani controlled the ball off an advancing attacking scrum to dot down the try that with Ahmed’s conversion made it 13-10 to the Stormers with 13 minutes to go.
But on 4G pitches you can’t afford to give the opposition momentum and Edinburgh struck back with a well constructed try to their young replacement backline player Rory McHaffie, with the Stormers’ defence being narrowed before Edinburgh went wide to put him in at the corner.
The Stormers had enough physical dominance to come back for the winner, but physical dominance means nothing when the basics are not on point. And this was a night, certainly when it came to the lineouts, where the Stormers were a million miles away from anything even vaguely resembling efficiency.
The Stormers did pick up a losing bonus point and will return from a tricky tour where both games were played on their least favoured surface and in tricky conditions with six log points they might have been happy to settle for before they left Cape Town. But they would be selling themselves if they did not see this game for what it was - a missed opportunity.
Scores
Edinburgh 17 - Tries: Paul Hill and Rory McHaffie; Conversions: James Grayson 2; Penalty: James Grayson. DHL Stormers 13 - Try: Hacjivah Dayimani; Conversion: Yaqeen Ahmed; Penalties: Yaqeen Ahmed 2.