Stormers preparing for kicking barrage from ‘old school’ Scarlets

The Stormers are gearing up for a kicking barrage from Scarlets when the teams collide in their United Rugby Championship (URC) clash at the Cape Town Stadium on Saturday afternoon (kick-off 4pm).

Scarlets are one of the URC’s regular strugglers, and started the season with losses against fellow Welsh clubs Cardiff and Dragons.

But they have since bounced back with a tight 27-26 win over Benetton, and a 47-14 thrashing of Newcastle Falcons in the Challenge Cup, built largely around their strong kicking game that sees them lead the URC kicking stats early in the season.

Game plan

The Stormers are thus expecting a similar game plan, which Director of Rugby John Dobson said went back to their heyday a decade ago when they won one of the previous iterations of the competition, the Pro12.

“They showed that with their result last weekend against Newcastle Falcons, who aren’t a gimme in the (English) Premiership like they were. So their style of rugby goes back to their DNA,” explained Dobson.

“The old Llanelli days of (legendary Welsh flyhalves) Phil Bennett and Barry John, and when they won the Pro12 (in the 2016-17 season) under Wayne Pivac, they were playing a sort of ‘total rugby’. It’s what they’ve always been proud of.

“I think what’s interesting for us is they’re leading the URC in terms of kicking metres (2,326m) and the kick battles. So they have a very good kicking game that gives them counterattack opportunities, and we have to be very sharp around our accuracy and kick cycles.

“It’s a bit like us a couple of years ago when we kicked the ball in order to create that sort of chaos and space for us. Look, they’ve made a promising start, to beat a fully loaded Benetton with their internationals and then thrash Newcastle a week later, so we have to be ready for them.”

Rising stars

The Stormers have backed a slew of rising young stars to do the job against Scarlets, and Dobson explained that they needed to rest their Springbok stars, like Damian Willemse and Siya Kolisi, while also broadening their playing pool ahead of a tough December-January period.

“You’ve heard me talk enough recently about the ‘critical path’, but we want to give some of those Springboks their weeks (off), and we also wanted to broaden the pool, because of the busy schedule (for the Bok players),” said Dobson.

“Hopefully they (the Springboks) will play in the final of the Nations Championship at Twickenham on Sunday (at the end of November), and we are in Durban (playing the Sharks) the next Saturday.

“There is no way those (Bok) players are playing in Durban, unless they haven’t played for the Springboks or something like that. So we need depth for that squad, and then it’s an eye watering run of fixtures (in the URC and Champions Cup into January).

“I need as big a squad as possible and they can’t go into that (November international) break on no rugby. So that’s why it’s important to get these guys some game time.”