The DHL Stormers bounced back from their disappointing defeat to the Ospreys the week before by scoring a comprehensive 42-12 win over Leinster in their round 15 Vodacom United Rugby Championship fixture at the DHL Stadium on Saturday.
The Stormers arguably made heavy weather of it in the second half after going to halftime 23-0 up playing into the wind but when Willie Engelbrecht ran in near the posts off a deft bit of handling from fellow loose-forward replacement Hacjivah Dayimani for the fourth try 10 minutes from time it was mission accomplished for the hosts.
🔥 Warrick Gelant, STOP THAT!
— Vodacom United Rugby Championship (URC) (@URCOfficial_RSA) April 27, 2024
An outrageous dummy from the DHL @THESTORMERS flyer 😮💨@Vodacom | #URC | #RaceToTheEight | #STOvLEI pic.twitter.com/6N1lBhSOqV
The bonus-point win means they jump to fifth on the log with three games to play, and the two-match tour that comes up next could decide their quest for a top-four spot and a home quarterfinal. At the moment they still require teams ahead of them to trip up, something they didn’t do in this round with the exception of Leinster, but it will still be a big confidence booster for the Stormers to have won so comfortably against the log leaders.
👀 Blink and you’ll miss him!
— Vodacom United Rugby Championship (URC) (@URCOfficial_RSA) April 27, 2024
Lightning-quick speed from Herschel Jantjies ⚡️ @Vodacom | #URC | #RaceToTheEight | #STOvLEI pic.twitter.com/9HWcQUUAm8
Of course, it wasn’t Leinster’s strongest team but it used to be said that the Leinster second team is strong enough to finish second on the URC log so it should be concerning that they lost both games they played in South Africa so heavily. Had Manie Libbok been a fraction to the right with the touchline conversion to Warrick Gelant’s try at the end and not hit the post, the score would have been exactly the same as last week’s annihilation at the hands of the Emirates Lions - 44-12.
⚡️ @THESTORMERS storm to a thumping victory over Leinster.@vodacom #URC | #RaceToTheEight | #STOvLEI pic.twitter.com/8fOFVEXRM4
— Vodacom United Rugby Championship (URC) (@URCOfficial_RSA) April 27, 2024
That is though 86 points conceded across two games, with 24 points scored, and if you recall that the last time Leinster were in South Africa they fielded an academy team that conceded over 60 points and a record defeat to the Vodacom Bulls, then clearly this country is not a happy hunting ground for the proud Irish province.
In comparison to the last three games played at DHL Stadium, against Ulster, La Rochelle and the Ospreys, this was a relatively stress-free game for the Stormers fans and the Stormers coaching staff. Libbok had a poor game against the Ospreys and didn’t start well when he fluffed the kick-off, but the resulting scrum gave the Stormers the opportunity to net the first of several scrum penalties.
Their dominant scrum set the tone for the Stormers' performance, as did the greater intensity they brought to their defensive game in comparison to last week. It was that aggressive defence that effectively set up the first try for the Stormers in just the fourth minute, with Leinster centre Charlie Ngatai spilling the ball and wing Ben Loader outstripping the cover defence to score.
The Stormers had a few other early scoring opportunities, but Leinster were determined to prevent them getting the kind of head start the Lions did at altitude seven days earlier. The visitors partially achieved that objective in the sense that the Stormers had to wait until right at the end of the half to get their second try, with skipper Salmaan Moerat an unstoppable force as he drove over.
KEEPING THE PRESSURE UP
However, what the Stormers did right in this game was understand the value of scoreboard pressure. Libbok kicked three first-half penalties to ensure that the Stormers steadily drew away from Leinster, which forced them to play catch-up. In the first half they were woeful at that, making far too many errors, but they did have a brief purple patch when they scored two tries in the space of two minutes, in the 50th and 52nd minute.
That briefly threatened a Leinster fightback and the momentum was against the Stormers for about a 15-minute period, with five successive second-half penalties to Leinster eventually seeing the referee lose patience and yellow card Evan Roos. In truth though, even with 14 men the Stormers’ win was never really threatened, and any real chance of the visitors making it a competitive game was snuffed out when Herschel Jantjies, after the initial break had been made by Damian Willemse, weaved his way through the defenders to score near the posts in the second minute of the second half.
That made it 30-0 and at that point it looked as though Leinster might be set to concede 50, but as was the case in Johannesburg, they never gave up trying and made the Stormers work for the four try bonus point.
It was a much better performance from the Stormers, a tighter one too, in comparison to against the Ospreys, with the pack paving the way. If you had to choose a stand-out, it would probably be the hard working lock Ruben van Heerden, but Ben-Jason Dixon, Roos and his fellow half centurion Marcel Theunissen weren’t far behind.
And then of course there was the veteran, the 39-years-young Brok Harris, who got to run onto the field with his children to mark his 150th cap. For him, and for Roos and Theunissen, who followed him out individually to mark their respective 50th caps, there was plenty of reason to celebrate.
SCORES
DHL Stormers 42 - Tries: Ben Loader, Salmaan Moerat, Herschel Jantjies, Willie Engelbrecht and Warrick Gelant; Conversions: Manie Libbok 4; Penalties: Manie Libbok 3.
Leinster 12 - Tries: Max Deegan and Rob Russell; Conversion: Sam Pendergast.