CAPE TOWN - The Stormers go into their first break in the Super Rugby season this week and after Saturday’s 41-10 win over the Southern Kings in Port Elizabeth, coach Robbie Fleck should be elated at how the early part of the team’s campaign has gone.
Although the bonus point picked up at Mandela Bay Stadium was the first of the season for the Stormers, a closer look at the stats for the Cape team after three matches will show a compelling argument in favour of the massive improvement that has been made to the Stormers’ attacking potency since last season.
For a start, were the old bonus point system where a team automatically secured a bonus point if they scored four tries still in place, the Stormers would have a full house of log points after their three games. They scored five tries against the Bulls, four against the Jagaures and another six on Saturday. That is 15 tries across three games - an average of five per game.
It wasn’t only in the matches played in Super Rugby so far that the Stormers have hit target with their attacking game. They scored nine tries against a strong Lions side in their final warm-up match, and they also easily dispatched the Cheetahs in Harare. They built up both a winning and try scoring habit in the pre-season that has been carried through into the competition.
What is encouraging is that a high percentage of those tries have been scored by the backs, and many of them have been quite spectacular efforts executed from long range. The inside pass with which Robert du Preez put EW Viljoen away in the buildup to the second try, scored by Bjorn Basson on the other side of the field, was an example of the class that has been added to the Stormers’ game during the off-season.
Talking of Basson, even though Leolin Zas was ruled out for the season before it even started, there is plenty of pace in reserve for the Stormers this year, and that is important given the type of game they want to play. Poor Kings defence was responsible for Dillyn Leyds’ try, but the wing has shown plenty of pace in the three games so far and is proving a difficult player for the opposition to stop out wide, while also contributing with his high work-rate in inside back positions once the play gets taken beyond third phase.
SP Marais at fullback has rightly been given a good rap at fullback and he contributed again on Saturday with the run that led to Justin Philips’ try. Talking of Philips, Fleck’s decision to mix and match his selections to give young and fringe players an opportunity was both laudable and successful.
The Stormers will benefit from the game time that Philips was given in Port Elizabeth, should there be injuries later in the competition, and ditto for Jaco Coetzee, Damian Willemse and, in particular, Dan du Plessis.
The young inside centre is starting to look the part of the future star he has been touted as, and while he was only playing on Saturday as Dan Kriel was being rested as a precautionary measure, he turned in a performance that should make Fleck very comfortable at the thought of starting him in bigger games if it becomes necessary.
Jean-Luc du Plessis, another player rested on Saturday, is rightly being seen as the first choice pivot, but Robert du Preez showed his capabilities in general play at Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium. It was also great to see Kurt Coleman get a chance to prove that he still exists on the local rugby radar. If you were to add young Willemse to the list of flyhalves, it looks quite an extensive one.
The anticipated front-row rotation also bore dividends in Port Elizabeth, with Frans Malherbe making a good fist of his first start, and the same can be said for Oli Kebble.
Of course, as in the other games they have played, the Stormers weren’t always perfect on Saturday. They fell away for a time in the second half, and as that also happened against the Bulls and the Jaguares, perhaps that is a concern that Fleck might look at as he contemplates the tough phase of the season his team will go into once they have played the Sunwolves in two weeks time.
The Kings only scored one try on Saturday but there have been occasional problems with the defence, and in Port Elizabeth it wasn’t really tested. Even though the New Zealand teams have been quite error ridden so far this year in comparison to past seasons, defence is something that the Stormers are going to have to perfect before the sequence of matches against Kiwi teams arrives.
However, at this point the Stormers supporters really couldn’t have expected more from their team than has been delivered and the Cape side can feel contented as they go into their short break.