DHL Stormers coach John Dobson reflected after his team’s defeat to the Vodacom Bulls that it cost his team in their quest for a home playoff, but the reality is that a top four finish on the final Vodacom United Rugby Championship log is still very much in the Cape team’s sights.
While in a weekend of big shifts in the log the Stormers dropped from fifth to ninth, which currently means they are outside of both playoff and Investec Championship Cup qualification, a closer look at the log situation, taking the points into account, unveils a very interesting scenario. Edinburgh are currently the fourth placed team after their hard fought win over the Ospreys at the weekend, a difference of five places, but there are only four log points, meaning one win, separating the teams. And Edinburgh just happen to be the team the Stormers face next.
Now that the Bulls, courtesy of their good drought breaking win over the Stormers at Loftus, have established themselves as the South African flag-bearers in the competition for this season, the local focus should shift towards getting two local sides into the top four. With over 50 000 people filing into Loftus for the pool game between the Bulls and the Stormers, there are obvious benefits to having two South African quarterfinals.
The Stormers making the top four should also suit the Bulls, as neither team should want a repeat of last year, when the sides had to meet in the quarterfinal phase, effectively limiting the number of local teams in the semifinals to just one.
Although the Stormers were well beaten at the weekend, the Bulls will know the Stormers are good enough to reverse the result if they have to go back to Loftus for a play-off and it is a venue where they won last season and the season before that. It would be far better for the Bulls to host an overseas team that will be more disadvantaged by travel and the altitude factor.
Home team take the spoils at Loftus. #BULvSTO #iamastormer #dhldelivers @Vodacom #URC pic.twitter.com/HWeY4BiIWa
— DHL Stormers (@THESTORMERS) March 2, 2024
LIONS COULD BOOST SA REPRESENTATION IN PLAYOFFS
The possibility of a South African derby in the quarterfinals has been increased by the Emirates Lions’ five point haul against the Hollywoodbets Sharks in the other South African derby played at the weekend.
𝗙𝘂𝗹𝗹 𝘁𝗶𝗺𝗲: Emirates Lions 40 – 10 Hollywoodbets Sharks
— Lions (@LionsRugbyCo) March 2, 2024
Joburg, your support fuels the Pride! 🦁#LIOvsSHA @Vodacom #URC #UnitedWeRise #OriginRound #GrassrootsToGreatness#LionsPride🦁 pic.twitter.com/rzhg3hO5Jc
The Lions are now just three points behind the top eight bracket that signifies playoff as well as Champions Cup qualification, and could well end up having to play the Bulls or, less likely because they are unlikely to finish higher than fourth and the Lions probably won’t end higher than seventh, the Stormers. The playoffs are played on a first placed finisher versus eighth, second versus seventh formula.
IRISH EYES ARE SMILING AGAIN
For now though, after a weekend of significant jumps and falls on the log, it is not the South African sides, but the Irish, who have something to crow about. Wins for Ulster, Munster and Connacht have lifted those three teams from borderline top eight qualification to fifth, sixth and seventh respectively.
Connacht climbed from 10th to their current seventh, while Munster were outside of the top eight, in ninth, at the start of the weekend, and are now effectively level with fourth placed Edinburgh and fifth placed Ulster on points.
Benetton’s defeat to Glasgow Warriors means in the space of just two rounds the Italian side have dropped six places. That’s an indication of how close it is with seven rounds to go, and even a top four position is in sight for the Lions if they finish the season strongly for they are just five outside of the top four.
BULLS HAVE REBUILT THEIR FORTRESS
That’s all in the future, and the log table is so jammed up it is almost impossible to predict the outcome when the league phase of the season winds down in early June.
What we do know is that the Bulls have rebuilt Loftus back into a fortress with their win over a Stormers team that won in Pretoria in their last two visits. The Bulls are four behind Leinster, who they play in their second match in a two game mini-tour (their other opponents are the Dragons) at the end of the month. They are second on the same number of points as Glasgow, who failed to pick up a bonus point in their win over Benetton.
The Bulls’ chances of finishing at least in the top two are excellent, for they have a sequence of home games at Loftus before ending with one final away derby against the Sharks to come after their tour. With their home game against Edinburgh being followed by one against Ulster, both teams in the race for top four spots, the Stormers could be in the top four by Easter.
But for now it is the Irish who are rallying, and it is Edinburgh, courtesy of a hard fought home win over the Ospreys, who join the likely top three - Leinster, Bulls and Glasgow - in the much coveted top four bracket. The Edinburgh game, won by just four points, was the only close one of round 11, with the South African derbies not being the close affairs most would have predicted.
CROWDS UNDERLINE HEALTHY STATE OF SA RUGBY
Although there is only one local team in the top eight, it was a weekend that underlined the healthy position South African rugby finds itself in subsequent to the decision to switch to the URC from Super Rugby. The crowd of 50 000 that turned up at Loftus to see a top quality game despite the conditions would have been unheard of in the last years of Super Rugby before the intervention of Covid and even the Lions/Hollywoodbets Sharks game in Johannesburg appeared to be played in front of a better crowd than that venue has hosted recently.
With the next derby fixtures scheduled for the final round of the league phase, now comes a period where we will see how much draw the games against overseas opponents will have. The signs are good, for more than 10 000 people have already bought tickets for the Stormers’ round of 16 Investec Champions Cup game against LaRochelle more than a month from now and there has been similar interest in the more immediate URC visits by Edinburgh and Ulster.
With Munster and the Glasgow Warriors set to come to Loftus, and Ulster’s revival set to be tested by the Sharks in Durban in the next round, there are some big URC games with potentially huge crowds for local fans to look forward to.
Weekend Vodacom United Rugby Championship results
Munster 45 Zebre 29
Edinburgh 19 Ospreys 15
Emirates Lions 40 Hollywoodbets Sharks 10
Benetton 9 Glasgow Warriors 19
Vodacom Bulls 40 DHL Stormers 22
Connacht 26 Scarlets 10
Cardiff Rugby 20 Leinster 33
Ulster 49 Dragons 26