The Stormers roll into North Harbour in search of their second win on New Zealand soil.
Kick off is at 09h35 SA time.
Blues: 15 Charles Piutau, 14 Frank Halai, 13 Francis Saili, 12 Jackson Willison, 11 Rene Ranger, 10 Chris Noakes, 9 Piri Weepu, 8 Peter Saili, 7 Luke Braid, 6 Steven Luatua, 5 Ali Williams (captain), 4 Culum Retallick, 3 Angus Ta’avao, 2 Keven Mealamu, 1 Tom McCartney.
Replacements: 16 Quentin MacDonald, 17 Ofa Tu’ungafasi, 18 Anthony Boric, 19 Brendon O’Connor, 20 Jamison Gibson-Park, 21 Baden Kerr, 22 Lolagi Visinia.
Stormers: 15 Joe Pietersen, 14 Gio Aplon, 13 Juan de Jongh, 12 Jean de Villiers (captain), 11 Bryan Habana, 10 Gary van Aswegen, 9 Dewaldt Duvenage, 8 Duane Vermeulen, 7 Rynhardt Elstadt, 6 Siya Kolisi, 5 Andries Bekker, 4 De Kock Steenkamp, 3 Frans Malherbe, 2 Deon Fourie, 1 Steven Kitshoff.
Replacements: 16 Scarra Ntubeni, 17 Pat Cilliers, 18 Eben Etzebeth, 19 Nizaam Carr, 20 Louis Schreuder, 21 Elton Jantjies, 22 Damian de Allende.
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Blues will have too much fire power
I’m always left with a sour taste in my mouth when I watch teams such as the Stormers, Blues, Brumbies, Bulls, Kings, Reds, Crusaders…such purpose, direction, accuracy and drive to succeed. You can see that these teams are well drilled.
Blues lead 9-3
@GreatSharksays (Comment 2) :
The vast majority of the time the best drilled team wins.
When you combine a well drilled unit with even a bit of talent then you have a very good combination.
@VinChainSaw (Comment 4) : Agree, look at the Brumbies for example. They have no equal in this competition when it comes to match preparation. So many of their tries are scored by numbers 11, 14 and 15. The game plan is clear, create scoring opportunities for your outside backs.
Why o why not take 3 points? š„
Straight in front. Why go for the #$%! lineout? Why? Why? š„ š„
This sucks.
Well done Blues.
Blues simply too good
oooh – close now
de villiers! What a try!
Final score
Blues 18
Stormers 17
Stormers try rolling it up at the death, to get into a position to drop goal; and then Jantjies stands so far back that the pass to him takes forever- annnd it’s not over. They really hashed that one up! šÆ
Stormers lost on their discipline at the rucks. They operate a fine line between contesting and going offisides and going off their feet.
Although I’ll be the first to admit that most of the calls went the Blue’s way.
Good fight back by the Streamers it seems
@FireTheLooser (Comment 15) : Yes, once again my favourite centre Juan De Jong hit the gap at the right angle and speed to create the try for Jean De Villers. Oh if only our centres had that kind of vision. But Stormers over contested at the rucks and got their asses penalized.
So all in all, a decent fightback that was let down by ill-discipline at the rucks.
Sounds like Jean getting his mojo back this year. Should make some interesting selections coming Bok time
@Bokhoring (Comment 17) : He’s captain.
so this result moves the Stormers above the Sharks on the SA conference log, by 1 point.
We are now 4th
@McLovin (Comment 18) : I mean at inside centre. So would HM stick with him at 13, or move him back to 12
@Bokhoring (Comment 20) : Going to be an interesting selection.
Angry… We lost this one. Took me this long to post, had to wait for the rage to sibside.