URC result: Stormers edge Lions in Cape Town thriller

The Stormers came back from trailing for most of the match and losing a player to a red card to beat the Lions 29-24 in a round 18 United Rugby Championship match in Cape Town on Saturday.

The Cape-based team secured their position of fifth in the final URC standings and will play away from home in the quarter-finals next weekend.

With the bonus point secured for finishing within seven points of the Stormers, the Lions moved up the log to eighth from ninth and for a brief moment were in the playoffs spot. But Ospreys’ win against Cardiff knocked the Lions out of the top eight and they will again play Challenge Cup rugby next year.

All the quarter-final matches will be finalised later Saturday.

Lions lose at the death

Ivan van Rooyen’s Lions though will be kicking themselves for not finishing off the Stormers and grabbing what would have been a well-deserved win in their match on Saturday.

Though this was a tight game where no team really got on top of the other, the Lions enjoyed the lead for most of the match and looked to be heading to a win midway through the second half, but a late decision to kick a penalty rather than kick to touch and try score a try ultimately cost the Lions.

This was in spite of the fact the Stormers had been reduced to playing with 14 men for most of the second spell after Angelo Davids was red carded for a dangerous tackle on Sanele Nohmaba, who was stretched off the field. The Lions also lost Rabz Maxwane to injury early on, while replacement Marius Louw was yellow carded for pushing Davids over after his tackle on Nohamba.

But after the Lions’ successful penalty in the 76th minute to go 24-22 up, the Stormers won a late penalty, kicked to touch for the lineout, and scored what would be the winning try through Adre Smith, with Manie Libbok converting.

Earlier the Lions scored tries by Francke Horn and JC Pretorius while the Stormers’ earlier tries came via Andre-Hugo Venter, Davids and Evan Roos.