The Bulls did not bring the fire to the Cape Town Stadium for their URC quarter-final against the Stormers, writes Ashfak Mohamed.
Cape Town – If the Bulls were to stand any chance of causing an upset at Cape Town Stadium, they needed to bring the fire from the start of the United Rugby Championship quarter-final against the Stormers.
Instead, it was John Dobson’s team who appeared to be the hungrier of the two sides, and they maintained that momentum throughout for what turned out to be a quite comfortable 33-21 victory in front of a buzzing 44,109 crowd.
Even before kick-off, the Bulls were already on the back foot when Springbok star Canan Moodie was withdrawn after failing a fitness test on his right hamstring, though it would be disingenuous to suggest that was the main reason for the Pretoria side’s defeat.
Coach Jake White rightly felt before the game that his team usually make the step-up in play-off matches, but this time round the Bulls hardly fired a shot from the outset.
While the visitors can justifiably complain they were on the wrong side of referee Jaco Peyper’s whistle, with a number of Stormers indiscretions such as forward passes and knock-ons just ignored, the Bulls needed to make their own luck – and weren’t able to.
Kurt-Lee Arendse was seldom brought into the game with ball-in-hand on attack, and the Bulls halfbacks Embrose Papier and Chris Smith didn’t kick enough to win territory either.
Instead, it was Stormers No.10 Manie Libbok who sparked his team’s opening try with a devastating line-break, with No 8 Hacjivah Dayimani rounding off in the left-hand corner.
And whenever the Bulls did have possession, they wasted opportunities in the lineouts, struggled to put meaningful phases together with ball-in-hand, and lost the gain-line battle as the Stormers’ rush defence disrupted their rhythm, while Deon Fourie and Steven Kitshoff were a handful at the breakdowns.
Fullback Johan Goosen’s enforced departure early in the second half didn’t help the Bulls’ cause either, as they were still in the contest at half time when the score was 17-7 to the Stormers.
But Kitshoff and his bunch of warriors weren’t going to give up a chance to host next week’s semi-final against Connacht and give the loosehead prop another “farewell” game before he joins Ulster next season, and a bit of magic from that man Damian Willemse eventually ended up in Angelo Davids’ touchdown.
The Stormers are much further in their development as a squad than the Bulls, and it is showing in their organisation and cohesion on attack and defence, and their execution from the set-pieces.
In contrast, despite rallying late in the season to make it to the quarter-finals, the Bulls need to think long and hard about adding extra bows to their attack, becoming more ruthless in defence, and having a real hard edge upfront.
White has already made some signings for next season, but there must also be consequences for some of his under-performing players going forward.
Points-scorers
Stormers 33 — Tries: Hacjivah Dayimani, Leolin Zas, Angelo Davids. Conversions: Manie Libbok (3). Penalties: Libbok (4).
Bulls 21 — Tries: Cyle Brink, Embrose Papier, Bismarck du Plessis. Conversions: Johan Goosen (1), Chris Smith (2).
