Lions into Challenge Cup quarters: ‘Immensely proud,’ says coach

In an action packed weekend in the Challenge Cup the Lions produced a brilliant performance with 14-men to thrash French giants Racing 92 51-28 at Ellis Park, while a valiant Cheetahs side went down 36-21 to Toulon in France.

The Lions now move onto the quarterfinals where they will face Glasgow Warriors in Scotland over the coming weekend, while the Cheetahs European journey comes to an end.

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The Lions will be extremely happy with a massive performance against Racing, especially after they played over 60 minutes with 14-men.

‘Immensely proud’

Flank Emmanuel Tshituka was red carded in the 18^th minute for a high fend on Racing fullback Louis Dupichot while on a rampaging run, and with the Lions holding a 12-7 lead at that point it seemed they were in for a long and difficult game.

However, the team rallied brilliantly to lead 27-14 at halftime and then doubled their score by the end of the game, as they ran in seven tries to the visitors four in a ruthless performance that will give the team a lot of confidence going into the business end of the competition.

“I am immensely proud. The guys worked extremely hard to get this result, especially with the red card. You could see by the end, there were guys that were just exhausted,” said a happy Lions coach Ivan van Rooyen after the match.

“That is what it’s going to take to win games like this against a great team full of Test stars. Even though they travelled (from France), so did we (back from Italy).”

Lions young flank Ruan Venter is certainly making a name for himself this season and was deservedly named man-of-the-match after a superb performance that included a brilliant try where he ran over 20 metres, bumping off and dragging defenders along the way.

“It was a nice game. It was a bit tough once we lost Manu (Tshituka) but I think it was great character shown (from the players) and we just kept on going,” said Venter after the match.

“There is belief in this squad. We believed we could beat them and we believed we could beat them by a lot. That’s what we tried to do and we executed it.”

Fighting loss

For the Cheetahs they will be disappointed to be out of the competition but can hold their heads high after a fighting loss against overwhelming favourites Toulon.

The French giants put in an accomplished first half performance to lead 19-0 at the break, but the Cheetahs bounced back with a top second half showing, with them running in three converted tries to win the second half 21-17, which they should take a lot of heart from.

With the Cheetahs now out of Europe they will turn all of their focus to the Currie Cup where they will hope to put in a big showing over the coming weeks.