Loftus win came at perfect time for Stormers

It would be interesting to hear from the DHL Stormers’ director of rugby John Dobson what he would have chosen had he been given an either or choice - the agony of the solitary point defeat in the Cape Town derby against the Vodadom Bulls or the delight of winning again at Loftus.

Of course, had Clayton Blommetjies kicked what should have been a match winning conversion at DHL Stadium three weeks ago, the two teams might have taken a different mindset into the Loftus game and the Bulls might well have won.

So in the end the two results cancel each other out.

However, from the perspective of the Stormers’ challenge in the Vodacom United Rugby Championship, the 19-16 win at a drenched Loftus came at the perfect time for the Stormers.

For they now head into a three-week break where much work will be done to re-set their challenge when they return to work with two difficult but winnable overseas games against Ulster and Scarlets before they return for the four game home run that ends the season for them.

Dobson’s team went into a shorter two week break after the loss to the Emirates Lions and he said then that it wasn’t good to be going into a break off a defeat.

So now the converse is true - with just one point separating them from eighth placed Connacht, a top eight finish is well within their reach and even a top four finish is possible after a weekend of upset results where all the teams in the top six lost with the exception of runaway log leaders Leinster.

CAPE SIDE CAN RETURN REFRESHED AND STRENGTHENED

This three-week break is long enough for the Stormers to return feeling they are starting a fresh new campaign, and to add to that freshness they should also have the ace backline trio of Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu, Damian Willemse and Suleiman Hartzenberg back for their mini-tour and then JD Schickerling back when, three weeks after the tour, they resume again in mid-April with their home run.

If you look at what the Stormers face now in their quest for as a high a finish in the URC as they can manage, you can see the benefits of them having been knocked out of the EPCR competitions.

They have six games to play between now and the end of May, which is hardly taxing and it could give them an advantage over opponents who are committed across two fronts.

Winning at Loftus, their third win there in four starts in the URC, will have done wonders for their confidence and will give Dobson a platform to work from when his team return after a short break to start preparing for the overseas trip.

HALFBACKS WERE RIGHT FOR THE CONDITIONS

One thing that would have come out of the Pretoria game for Dobson would have been Jurie Matthee’s suitability for a horses for courses flyhalf role when it is wet, which it could well be when the Stormers head north as it is still winter in the last week’s of March.

He may have been guilty of passing too much at times, particularly in the first half, something that Dobson appeared to note afterwards, but otherwise the youngster controlled the game superbly in the wet as did scrumhalf Stefan Ungerer in the first half.

It was suggested beforehand that the Stormers’ halfbacks for Loftus would give their team a good chance if it was wet, and that proved the case.

“If I was to single somebody out, I’d say Jurie Matthee; he’s an unheralded guy and in those conditions, he did a really, really good job,” said Dobson afterwards.

“I still thought we did a bit with the ball, and the first half was a bit frustrating. I thought we could have kicked earlier. And we were trying to sort of move it around a bit, which was one of the messages at halftime (to kick sooner).

"That sounds really simplistic: kick quicker, kick sooner. I thought we were poor like that in the first half. But then in the second half, we were really a bit more direct with the kicking.”

Aside from mentioning Matthee, Dobson also singled out Ungerer, who is the one experienced scrumhalf on the Stormers books who will still be with them next season when Herschel Jantjies and Paul de Wet have left for France and the Bulls respectively.

“I could say it was my advanced meteorological skills because we chose them (Ungerer and Matthee) two weeks ago, because we had a bye,” Dobson joked.

“But Stef Ungerer is exceptional. He’s one of the best kicking nines in South Africa, we’re still going to see the best of him. So that really did work for us.”

LIBBOK UNLIKELY TO PLAY AGAIN THIS SEASON

Having Ungerer and Matthee in his playing group does give Dobson a horses for courses alternative that not many teams do and there is a good argument for keeping Matthee on the Stormers’ books even though there are effectively three Bok flyhalves above him in the pecking order (Feinberg-Mngomezulu, Libbok and Willemse).

Libbok by the way was walking with a leg brace when the team trained at the HPC in Bellville last week and looks unlikely to play again this season, but that will offer Feinberg-Mngomezulu a chance to play his preferred position of flyhalf, something he has done more for the Springboks at this stage of his career than he has done for the Stormers.

Then of course there is also the option of playing Matthee with Feinberg-Mngomezulu outside him at centre, something that worked a charm when the Stormers beat the Sharks in Durban last February.

WE MISSED GERT SMAL - DOBSON

The Stormers’ outlook suddenly looks a lot more rosy than it did, and you could excuse Dobson for making a press conference quip in response to his adversary Jake White’s chirp in the buildup that he was surprised the Stormers didn’t list the legendary Carel du Plessis as one of their injured players.

“Obviously, we missed Gert Smal…and Carel du Plessis, those were two big losses. But Evan (Roos) stood in well for Gert. No, I’m being flippant because the injury thing is an issue across all the teams. I felt for the Bulls today, they had three guys go off.”

They did indeed, and the wet weather was also a massive leveller. Given the personnel they had at their disposal, the Stormers stood a good chance once the storm that delayed kickoff arrived as the Bulls, with Willie le Roux at flyhalf and the Bulls back three not exactly noted for their solidity under the contestable kicks, weren’t well equipped for a wet weather game.

Regardless of the circumstances it was a huge win for the Stormers as the bleak outlook before the game was merited - had the Stormers lost, they would have slipped below Zebre into second last on the URC log.

Which isn’t good enough for a team representing the rugby rich Cape region. But they were due for a bit of luck after some of the rotten luck that has gone against them this season and the upshot is that the playoffs are well within their grasp and even a top four finish is possible if they win all their remaining games.

On that note, Dobson said after the narrow loss to the Bulls that “After that performance there is no reason we shouldn’t win all our remaining games”.

They didn’t, because they lost the next game to the Lions, but don’t bet your house against them winning every league game from here. If you look at what remains, and the gaps in their schedule that will enable them to refresh, the hardest part of the season is definitely behind them.

And suddenly there is a shaft of light and a potential pot of gold at the end of the tunnel.