The DHL Stormers gave themselves the best imaginable Christmas present as they surged to the top of the South African Shield in the Vodacom United Rugby Championship with a thumping 37-27 win over their arch-rivals the Vodacom Bulls at DHL Stadium on Friday evening.
Two days before Christmas is an odd time to stage a north/south derby but a 30 000 crowd was a ringing endorsement for festive season rugby and the style with which the URC champions buried their former nemesis will probably ensure many come back for the game against the Emirates Lions here on New Year’s Eve.
By scoring four tries to three, with the last Bulls score being nothing more than a consolation effort really, the Stormers banked a full house of five log points and that is how many points they are clear at the top of the Shield ahead of the Bulls, and they have a game in hand.
What a performance. What a crowd. What a time to be alive in Cape Town. #STOvBUL #iamastormer #dhldelivers @Vodacom #URC pic.twitter.com/UfZSlleR86
— DHL Stormers (@THESTORMERS) December 23, 2022
The Stormers effectively buried the game well before the start of the third quarter, but it never looked like turning out that way at halftime, with the Bulls coming back strongly towards the end of the first half after going behind early to a Stormers team that came out of the blocks quicker and dominated the initial exchanges.
Manie Libbok kicked two penalties to give his team a 6-0 lead and then not long after Johan Goosen got the Bulls their first points, the hosts were awarded a penalty try as their forwards drove over the line but were illegally held up in the act of doing it.
That made it 13-3 after 23 minutes, and with the Bulls conceding their second yellow card, this time to Elrigh Louw who followed an earlier card to Marco van Staden for one of those idiotic modern sanctions for what was really an accidental clash of heads, it looked like the Stormers were taking control of the game.
But the Bulls came back in the last 15 minutes of the half, with former home hero Nizaam Carr crossing the line off a perfectly weighted kick pass from flyhalf Goosen.
The Bulls No 10 then kicked a penalty to make it 13-all at the break, with the Stormers perhaps kicking themselves at that point for missing out by having a lineout poached on the Bulls line on the stroke of halftime.
In the URC final back in June the team that had gained momentum by the break went on to win the game, which wasn’t a good sign for the Stormers.
TWO-TRY BURST
However, that reckoned without the attacking flair of the home side. Steven Kitshoff, the Stormers captain, was magnificent and all over the field throughout the 70 minutes he was on, and was a deserved man of the match.
However, he must have been pushed hard by No 8 Hacjivah Dayimani, who apart from his yeoman work in the lineouts in the absence of regular lock Salmaan Moerat, was all over the field as a linker and runner.
Dayimani featured with a pass through the tackle that created the Stormers’ third try, with the Stormers sweeping from deep in their own half to complete a magnificent try that has become typical of them.
That was in the 51st minute, and came just two minutes after Joseph Dweba, the Stormers hooker who is growing in stature with each game, drove over the line for the Stormers’ second try.
Joseph Dweba is a bulldozer! He bashes his way through the front door as DHL Stadium goes wild.
— DHL Stormers (@THESTORMERS) December 23, 2022
?? 20-13 ?? (47 mins)#STOvBUL #iamastormer #dhldelivers @Vodacom #URC pic.twitter.com/3JaHT3riGW
So it was effectively a two try burst in as many minutes that propelled the Stormers from a deadlocked score into a 27-13 lead.
And they weren’t finished. It took just another three minutes for wing Leolin Zas to make sure of the four-try bonus point, and thereafter it was a case of the Bulls having to desperately chase the game.
And that's what makes them the CHAMPIONS they are! ??#BKTURC #URC | #STOvBUL pic.twitter.com/IhaF0ia8X3
— BKT United Rugby Championship (URC) (@URCOfficial) December 23, 2022
They did well to respond with tries from Van Staden and Du Plessis, but as a whole the Bulls were forced too often into error by the swarming and physical Stormers defensive effort for the Bulls to be a realistic threat to the winners.
Just to make sure though, Manie Libbok did kick a 40 metre penalty in the 72nd minute to make sure that the game was safe.
The Bulls were playing for a four-try bonus point after that but apart from Du Plessis’s try, which really came too late as there was less than two minutes left on the clock, there was just no way through a Stormers team that chose the occasion to play like the champions they are.
SCORES
DHL Stormers 37 - Tries: Joseph Dweba, Sulieman Hartzenberg and Leolin Zas; Penalty try; Conversions: Manie Libbok 3; Penalties: Manie Libbok 4.
Vodacom Bulls 27 - Tries: Nizaam Carr, Marco van Staden and Bismarck du Plessis; Conversions: Johan Goosen 2 and Chris Smith; Penalties: Johan Goosen 2.