DHL Stormers coach John Dobson says he wishes they didn’t exist and when he said it his star loose forward Evan Roos was sitting next to him nodding his head vigorously, but the difficulties posed by 4G surfaces are something that the Cape team are thankfully starting to get used to.
The Stormers will be playing on a 4G surface when they clash with the Glasgow Warriors in their Vodacom United Rugby Championship quarterfinal on Saturday night. They have yet to win at the Warriors' home ground of the Scotstoun, and until relatively recently, they boasted a poor record on the kind of surface this weekend’s game is being played on.
That changed back in January when they edged home against Stade Francais in an exciting and close Investec Champions Cup pool game in Paris. They’ve played one more game on that kind of surface since then, which was their last overseas game against Connacht in Galway a few weeks ago.
So it’s effectively two wins on the bounce for the Stormers on 4G surfaces, so they take some momentum on their former bogey surface into the quarterfinal. As it turns out, momentum is precisely what they had to get used to about 4G pitches.
“We are starting to learn, and that’s exactly it, the big thing - the momentum piece, whether it is at maul time or ball carrying, it took time to get used to how the surface affects momentum. It is an incredibly unforgiving surface,” said Dobson before his team flew out to Glasgow this week.
“I would prefer them not to exist, quite frankly, from a player safety and lottery of the game perspective. You just had to see the recent game as an example, when Connacht were on our line. I don’t want to be boring, but it was a pick and go and the guy just needed to dig his studs into the ground and the momentum was with him.
“If you are on grass and there is a contract then the foot almost skids back, but on a 4G if they get their studs in they can actually cannon forward off it because their studs are not going to give. It makes it almost impossible to defend in those situations. It is dangerous too, because your legs can twist. We have done injuries like that on that kind of surface, it happened to Adre Smith in Cardiff last year.”
MUCH BETTER IDEA NOW
However, while he doesn’t like it, Dobson knows his team have to live with it and overcome it if they want to progress to a semifinal the following weekend. In that sense, he is far more confident of his players’ ability to deal with the surface than they were.
“In terms of playing on it we have a much better idea now, the momentum piece, the ball rolling piece, the scrum piece, how fast you have to be in a maul. It is less of a power maul rather than a speed maul if you want to get on top. It is very hard for one team of players to get back into the fight on a 4G pitch if the other team is quicker at setting the maul.
“The Dragons have a hybrid pitch, but the one in Galway is 4G, and the experience of playing on it and winning there was good for us. So we are a lot more confident and less daunted by it than we were and the experience on it of this past tour was very good for us in that respect,” added the Stormers coach.
The Stormers have in fact quite comprehensively overturned their poor record overseas over the past few months, with the Stade Francais win in Paris being followed by a good one against the formidable English team and Premiership log toppers and finalists, Northampton Saints at Franklin Gardens, before the wins over the Dragons and Connacht made it four in a row.
NEED TO STEP UP A LEVEL AGAINST GLASGOW
Not that Dobson or his team are going to be duped into feeling that they have it all completely sorted in their favour.
“We had good wins over the Dragons and Connacht but let’s be honest, neither of those teams made the URC playoffs. It will require a massive step up for us on Saturday as Glasgow were close to the top of the URC log all season,” said Dobson.
“But the fact of it, and what is in our favour now, is that being away in the northern hemisphere, playing on a 4G pitch, those aren’t the points any more. That is good for us and we are feeling a lot more confident. Also there is another factor, which I am sure is the same for northern teams that come to South Africa at this time of year, meaning the fact that 8 January in Glasgow is very different to 8 June in Glasgow.”
The Stormers team for the match will be announced on Friday but there were no injuries picked up in the 29-24 derby win that concluded the league season and Warrick Gelant is likely to be back at fullback.
“It was just a niggle that kept Warrick out of that game, we always knew we needed one of him or Damian (Willemse) at the back at the sharp end of the season, and with Damian out injured it was important that Warrick be protected so he can play,” said the coach.