STORMERS MAKE THE SAME MISTAKES IN BACK-TO-BACK DEFEATS TO SHARKS

IT WAS supposed to be their revenge attack against the Sharks in Durban after losing to them at home innie Kaap last week, but the Stormers were sent back home met hul stert tussen die bene after losing 36-24 on Saturday.

What irked coach John Dobson big time following the back-to-back defeats to JP Pietersen’s team in the United Rugby Championship was that his span made the same mistakes they made the week before when they lost 30-19 op hul eie voorstoep. Before that defeat in the Mother City, the Kapenaars were flying high – unbeaten at the top of the standings after eight rounds.

They’ve now slipped to third, with Dobson quoted by Rugby365 as saying after the latest setback: “The most frustrating thing is that everything that went wrong last week went wrong this week. There has to be a behaviour change; it is poor from us and bad for our supporters.”

The Sharks overturned a 17-14 halftime deficit into victory, after the Stormers broke out of the blocks quickly with a try by Cobus Reinach in the opening seconds.

A yellow card to Paul de Villiers allowed the Sharks to hit back with a try by Grant Williams to take a two-point lead, but Sacha Feinberg-Mgomezulu slotted two penalties within four minutes to reclaim the lead for the visitors.

This, however, was short-lived as Ethan Hooker broke through for the hosts’ second try early in the second quarter to edge ahead once again.

With the Sharks’ defence proving hard to breach as they dominated territory and possession, Feinberg-Mngomezulu added two more penalties before the break, which handed the Stormers a three-point lead going into halftime.

The visitors built on this momentum early in the second half with their second try – by De Villiers – to stretch their lead to 24-14, but this proved to be their last points of the match as the Sharks took control of the game and capitalised on their point-scoring chances.

Such was the quality of their attack, Andre Esterhuizen touched down before two more tries by Jaco Williams – one of which was when the Capetonians lost Ruben van Heerden to the sin bin.