Stormers and Springboks flyhalf Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu committed his future to the Cape franchise until 2029. He will be back to face the Bulls this weekend. Almost 100,000 fans went to stadiums to watch the United Rugby Championship’s round-eight action over the Christmas weekend as two derbies in Ireland, two in Wales, and one in Scotland caught the imagination.
South Africa’s players were on holiday, with several posting pics of family time. André “The Giant” Esterhuizen frolicking in the waves at a Durban beach with his tiny daughter was special. But it is back to the grindstone this week as the Sharks prepare to host the Lions on Saturday at 3.30 pm before the Stormers take on the Bulls in Cape Town in the late game (6 pm).
Fortunately for the SA teams, the five games played north of the equator have not changed the 16-team log too much and, of course, the SA teams have a game in hand — their matches originally scheduled for Boxing Day have been postponed to February. This weekend, there is a full round of matches, and although the four SA teams are playing each other, it is the same once more in the north, where there is a second round of local derbies. We take a look at how the South African teams are positioned ahead of the weekend’s matches in Durban and Cape Town.
[paywall]
John Dobson’s team were done a favour by Leinster, who beat Munster at Thomond Park in a tense 13-8 struggle. That prevented the men in red from going ahead of the Stormers at the top of the table. The Stormers are unbeaten, with seven wins from seven and 32 points, plus they have a game in hand on Munster and Cardiff (both 30 points).
The old cliché that the mark of a good team is that they win even when they are not at their best holds for the Stormers’ 34-27 defeat of the Lions. Game management let them down when they struggled to close out the game. This should be remedied this week with the return of two superstar generals in Damian Willemse and Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu.
The Bulls started the season playing iffy rugby but managing to win, but lately they have fallen away and lost five in a row (including Champions Cup matches). They are 10th on the URC points table with three wins from seven. The big issue with the Bulls is their porous defence.
While they are scoring well (26 tries in their seven games), they are leaking an average of five tries per game. The Bulls’ last game was in Durban, where they lost 21-12 despite having most of their Springboks back in the fold. The fallout from their loss has been spectacular.
Talk about pushing the panic button! Two assistant coaches were fired (Andries Bekker and Chris Rossouw), and an SOS was sent to SA Rugby for emergency coaching aid. One wonders how they will react if they lose a sixth game in a row on Saturday…
[/paywall]
