Hits & Misses: Raging Bulls and self-destructive Stormers

OPINION: What a rugby weekend it was.

There may have been heartbreak for the Stormers after their 11-20 defeat to Leinster in the United Rugby Championship semifinal in Dublin on Saturday, but it was an otherwise superb weekend for South African rugby with the Bulls overcoming Glasgow Warriors 21-22 in Edinburgh in the other last-four battle and the BlitzBoks claiming the SVNS World Championship title in Bordeaux yet again.

With everything that took place from Murrayfield to Stade Atlantique, we look at the highs and lows from the weekend’s rugby in Europe.

Hits:

BlitzBoks pulling a World Championship double

The BlitzBoks just had to reach the Final of the third SVNS World Championship event to lift their second consecutive title, and while that didn’t happen as they lost against Bordeaux winners France in the Cup semifinal on Sunday, they had done enough during the first two tournaments to claim the Championship a day early in France.

The South Africans were far from their best in Bordeaux, suffering defeats against Great Britain and Fiji in the group stages and then being aided into the quarterfinal by Argentina missing out on qualification for the play-offs and crashing out of the top eight as a result.

They narrowly beat rivals Fiji in the quarterfinal, but they would certainly have hoped to go further in the Cup competition.

Disappointing results aside, the BlitzBoks are now both World Series and World Championship winners, and on top of that, Tristan Leyds was named Men’s SVNS Player of the Year, with both he and Shilton van Wyk included in the Dream Team.

What a season.

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Raging Bulls at Murrayfield

The Bulls produced a comeback of note to book their Fourth URC Final, and that’s an achievement in itself.

But the way they did it was the real showstopper as they scored 19 unanswered points and kept the hosts scoreless for 55 minutes to steal a semifinal victory.

Johan Ackermann’s team not only dug deep to grind out a win by adapting to what was being thrown at them, but in doing so, they also took Glasgow’s ability to fully play their game away.

They showed remarkable composure and overcame immense early scoreboard pressure and yellow cards to do so. Sensational.

Stormers Taking the Fight to Leinster

It was never going to be easy for the Stormers in Dublin, especially after they lost flyhalf Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu in the quarterfinal against Cardiff, but they did better and came closer than most expected against the current URC title holders.

They trailed by just two points late in the third quarter and came undone thanks to losing two players when they just had to sustain the pressure and convert it into points.

While 20-11 sounds like a significant margin, the game was much closer than that scoreline suggests.

It was an unfortunate end to a superb effort.

Misses:

Stormers’ stack of cards

Any defeat is disappointing, no matter how it happens, but there’s a particular sting that comes with losing by a small margin or being in it until the very end, only to lose it late.

For the Stormers, the margin wasn’t small by the time the final whistle went anymore, but the way they were still very much in it, but walked away empty-handed thanks to those yellow cards will give them nightmares for some time to come.

Going from being 11-13 down with 12 minutes to go and having Leinster under the pump to the extent where their fans would have allowed themselves to think that their team just might pull an enormous upset to such a catastrophic final quarter was tough to watch.

Leolin Zas’s yellow and Ruan Ackermann’s red-card upgrade were fair results.

In terms of Salmaan Moerat’s yellow card, unless he has unreported 360-degree vision and professional-level heel-flicking ability, there is no way he could have intentionally aimed to kick the ball out of Jamison Gibson-Park’s hands.

Ackermann’s yellow card for a dangerous clean-out being upgraded to red was enough to do a number on the visitors, and it was no doubt warranted.

The way he charged into Rónan Kelleher was just reckless, and it’s a pity that it’s going to be one of the first things that comes to mind when reflecting on what was a fascinating contest.

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Dull end to shining season

The BlitzBoks are world champions, that’s probably all that matters, but the way they ended their campaign in Bordeaux was just poor.

In Valladolid last week, Philip Snyman’s crew overcame a patchy pool-stage display to finish runners-up in Spain and tighten their grip on the championship title.

But in France, they looked disjointed right from the start and failed to recover as they did a week before.

In their last assignment of the weekend, they were thrashed 14-40 by Spain, who finished the World Championship in third place, after injury struck on Sunday.

They went into that last game with just 10 players, so that definitely played a role.

Again, whatever happened after they were confirmed champions doesn’t really matter, but this team has got us so accustomed to expecting excellence from them that nothing else will do.