Advertisement

URC PLAYOFFS: Lions the exception as Stormers, Bulls track towards semis

rugby17 May 2026 07:00
By:Gavin Rich
Share
article image
Bulls © Gallo Images

The most riveting final round to a league season in the history of the Vodacom URC has conspired to deliver the DHL Stormers and the Vodacom Bulls the quarterfinals they would have preferred, with the ground-breaking SecureDrive Lions the odd one out among the South African teams.

Stormers host Cardiff and the Bulls welcome Munster to Loftus on what will be a double-header Saturday afternoon (30 May) in South Africa, while the Lions will have to travel to play Leinster in the last game, with Leinster building into red-hot form.

Advertisement

The Lions have plenty to celebrate, as while they were already assured of playoff qualification before their game against Munster in Limerick kicked off, the final match of the regular season in the competition, the bonus point they got for losing by seven points also secured them a guaranteed spot in next season’s Investec Champions Cup.

Had they finished eighth, they would have had to wait for Ulster’s quest in next week’s EPCR Challenge Cup final to qualify through that competition, in which case the eighth-placed URC team won’t qualify. It will be the first Lions appearance in the elite European competition.

A FORMIDABLE TASK IN DUBLIN

But what the Lions shouldn’t be happy about is that their failure to make full use of the opportunities in a tightly contested game at Thomond Park has left them with the formidable task of having to head back to Dublin, where they lost 31-7 in league play last week, for their first-ever quarterfinal in the competition.

Francke Horn’s men at least have recent experience of the AVIVA Stadium venue, where they did have their opportunities, as indeed they did against Munster, but given that Glasgow Warriors are struggling with their form, going to Dublin to play Leinster will have been the least-wanted quarterfinal. The Leinster/Lions game will be the last game of the quarterfinal weekend (29/30 May).

While most South Africans would have been supporting the Lions as they put in a desperate late quest to at least get a draw against Munster, with the visitors missing out on some gilt-edged scoring opportunities, that should not have been the case for the coaches and players of the Stormers and Bulls.

A draw would have sent the Lions to Cape Town to face the Stormers and a win would have sent them into fifth position and set up a trans-Jukskei derby showdown with the fourth-placed Bulls.

While a derby is a crowd puller and would thus have pleased the marketing departments at both clubs, the coaches would have felt they’d prefer to play a side that has the disadvantage of having to cross the equator to get to the game rather than just take a bus trip in the Bulls’ case or a two hour flight to Cape Town when it comes to a game against the Stormers.

There is also the extra edge and emotion that always seems to accompany the buildup to a derby, all of which would have meant that John Dobson and Johan Ackermann, the respective coaches of the Stormers and Bulls, would have watched those final, fraught minutes of the league season with some anxiousness.

STORMERS AND BULLS SHOULD FANCY THEIR CHANCES

Instead of playing the Lions, they will face overseas teams they should fancy themselves to beat. It might seem odd to say that, given that the Stormers’ opponents, Cardiff, beat them at the start of this past weekend and, in so doing, knocked them out of contention for a top-two finish.

But beating the Stormers on your own 4G surface, which the Cape team seems to really struggle on in a game where you are driven by the desperation that comes with playing for a piece of history and in front of your home crowd, is very different from facing the Stormers at DHL Stadium in front of their fans and on the grass surface they are comfortable with.

Given how dominant their scrum was at Cardiff Arms Park, the Stormers will fancy their chances of scrumming Cardiff to pieces in the return game, and with Ruhan Nel and Seabelo Senatla both set to return for the hosts, it will lead to improvement in the two areas where they suffered both in Ulster and Cardiff on this most recent tour - their defence and pacy strike-power out wide.

Cardiff dug deep and had the crowd behind them as they repelled the numerous Stormers entries into their 22 in the league game, but it will be tough to do that again at a venue where the crowd is not behind them but instead supporting their opponents.

The Stormers game will kick off at the perfect time to draw a big crowd to the Cape Town stadium,15.30, with the Bulls hosting Munster in a 13.00 kick-off at Loftus. We are no longer in summer, so that is not the advantage to the hosts that it would be in December through to February, but it is still probably the preferred time of day for the hosts in a game on the Highveld.

Munster have beaten the Bulls at Loftus and came close last time they visited, but they’ve struggled lately, with a lot apparently happening off the field at the Irish province, and they were lucky to get home as winners against the Lions at Thomond Park.

GLASGOW HAVE TRICKIEST ASSIGNMENT OF THE HOME TEAMS

In the other game, the 2024 champions Glasgow Warriors have arguably the trickiest quarterfinal for all the host teams, with Connacht visiting the Scotstoun Stadium in the game that kicks off the quarterfinal round on the Friday night.

Connacht have struck a rich vein of form and were as impressive in outplaying Edinburgh away at the weekend as they were in destroying Munster on their home field in Galway the week before that.

Their only loss in the last nine games in the URC was the one in Johannesburg to the Lions the week after a statement win over the Stormers in Cape Town.

They are also well acquainted with playing on the 4G surface they will be presented with in Glasgow, as their home field is 4G. Glasgow were lucky to beat Ulster in their final league game, with Ulster also fielding an under-strength team, so they may be vulnerable to an early exit even though they ended top of the log in the regular season, thanks mainly to the Stormers' faltering on their two-match tour.

QUARTERFINAL LINE-UP (seedings in brackets)

Friday, 29 May

Glasgow Warriors (1) v Connacht (8) - Scotstoun Stadium, Glasgow, 20.45

Saturday, 30 May

Vodacom Bulls (4) v Munster (5) - Loftus Versfeld, Pretoria, 13.00)

DHL Stormers (3) v Cardiff (6) - DHL Stadium, Cape Town, 15.30)

Leinster (2) v Fidelity SecureDrive Lions (7) - AVIVA Stadium, Dublin, 21.00)

Final round Vodacom URC results

Cardiff 22 DHL Stormers 16

Edinburgh 5 Connacht 28

Ulster 22 Glasgow Warriors 26

Hollywoodbets Sharks 54 Zebre 19

Vodacom Bulls 45 Benetton 19

Leinster 68 Ospreys 14

Scarlets 35 Dragons 35

Munster 24 Fidelity SecureDrive Lions 17

Advertisement