Stormers have their ‘pomp’ back after Leinster win

Stormers coach John Dobson believes his team has rediscovered their ‘pomp’ after they bounced back from a demoralising defeat against Ospreys with a thumping 42-12 United Rugby Championship (URC) win over Leinster at the Cape Town Stadium on Saturday night.

The Stormers were heavily criticised after their first ever home defeat to a Welsh team a week earlier, in a game where they were accused of overplaying and using the offload too much.

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However in the build-up to the Leinster match a number of coaches and players backed their playing style and said they had no intention of changing it over the rest of the season.

Dobson was thus vindicated as the Stormers produced a wonderful attacking performance to blow an admittedly understrength Leinster away, with most of their international stars back at home preparing for the Champions Cup semifinals.

“Tonight, the way it finished, I thought we had our pomp back. We are not going to change how we play, we just all learned last week to be a bit more circumspect,” said a delighted Dobson after the match.

“You could see we still lacked a bit of confidence and some of the same stuff was there in the first half. But the way we fought through that, makes me very proud. The team responded. Physically, the way we carried was very, very good.

“It didn’t build confidence, being in the corner that we were in, so it’s a massive credit to them for the way they fought. It was a really compelling performance.”

Built up front

Although the backs took a lot of the plaudits, with wing Ben Loader, scrumhalf Herschel Jantjies and fullback Warrick Gelant scoring some eye-catching tries, the win was built-up front where the Stormers dominated to lay the platform.

Prop Neethling Fouche was handed the man-of-the-match award after a sterling scrumming performance and admitted that the forward pack were looking to step it up after a disappointing performance the previous week, and said they would now build on this effort.

“We weren’t happy with last week’s performance particularly in the scrums, we let our fans down and we just wanted to come out and give them something to smile about,” explained Fouche.

“We still believe in ourselves, and we haven’t hit our straps like we would have liked yet. But there is confidence brewing and I think we are going to be dangerous down the back end of the competition.”

The Stormers now have a weekend off, while the Champions and Challenge Cup semifinals are battled out, before they head on a two game tour to the UK where they will face Dragons in Wales and Connacht in Ireland.

They then return to SA to close out the pool phase with a home encounter against the Lions at the Cape Town Stadium.