Stormers need to execute plan against Ospreys, says Hlungwani

The Stormers have been given a straightforward mandate by their assistant coach, Rito Hlungwani: to execute the plan set for their United Rugby Championship game against Ospreys to the tee when they meet on Saturday at Cape Town Stadium (kick-off at 7.15 pm).

The inaugural winners have no room to slip up as the race for the playoff spot is intensifying. With five games remaining in the URC regular season, the Stormers are on a mission to win all of them in their run-in. This would give them a shot at finishing in the top four of the URC points table. 

The Stormers are currently in fifth place with 39 points while Ospreys are in seventh with 35 points. Given how Ospreys are close to them the Stormers are looking for a win from the game.

 “We are playing a team that’s four points behind us, we can’t take it lightly. We want to go out there and win the game,” said Hlungwani.

Execute the plan

The forwards coach said the aim for the Ospreys clash is for the players to execute the game plan well because they believe if they do it to perfection, they will get the important win.

“We just want to execute our game; we believe in the way we play, if we can execute that against anyone we can get the results we require. That’s the big thing, we want to be the best version of ourselves,” he said.

“From their side, a lot of Northern Hemisphere teams come with a strong kicking game, we can negate that. We can be able to execute our plan.

“The big focus is performing as best as we can against Ospreys, we feel the team we have put out can do the job. The big thing is for us to go out and execute our plan and win the game. We feel we have put out a team that can execute the job,” Hlungwani.

‘JD will help us’

This week the Stormers announced that lock JD Schickerling will be returning to the franchise in the coming season following his stint in Japan. Hlungwani welcomed the signing of Schickerling, who he described as a hybrid lock.

“I’m very happy with that signing, I have worked with JD before, good player, smart, physical, he’s almost like a hybrid, he can play four and five,” Hlungwani said.

 “We are very happy with that signing, it’s extremely important that we build a squad that can hopefully compete in both competitions (URC and Champions Cup), hopefully having JD back can help us do that,” he said.