DHL Stormers determined to bounce back

After narrowly going down to the Cell C Sharks, the DHL Stormers are determined to get back to winning ways against the Brumbies at DHL Newlands on Saturday.

Despite dominating possession, the DHL Stormers were frustrated by some stern defence from the Durban side, with a late try handing the visitors an 18-13 victory.

While disappointed with their first defeat of the 2016 Vodacom Super Rugby season after putting the Cell C Sharks under so much pressure, Head Coach Robbie Fleck said that there was plenty of encouragement to take from the team’s performance.

“Obviously we are disappointed with the loss, everyone is gutted, but the team feels that there was enough out there that we can take forward.

“I can take a huge amount of positives from this performance, we are on a different path to them and we will take comfort from the fact that we can build so many phases on attack and put the defence under pressure.

“I felt that we had a nice blend to our game – we were attacking them wide, we attacked them through the middle and we had those attacking kicks in behind,” he said.

The DHL Stormers coach gave credit to the Cell C Sharks’ defensive effort and tactical kicking game which managed to frustrate his team’s atttacking intent.

“Credit to them, they defended extremely well and it was a very good tactical kicking performance.

“I didn’t expect anything different from the Sharks, that is their mindset, they certainly didn’t try and run at us and they exploited us with the kicking game,” he said.

Fleck believes that they will face a similar assault this weekend from a Brumbies side whose strengths lie in their tactical kicking and at the breakdown.

“We are going to face the same thing with the Brumbies,so we need to sharpen up there. The beauty about this game is that we can work on it this week.

“The Brumbies are a huge challenge which is twofold in the sense that they are a threat at the breakdown and with their kicking game, which is something that we have to brush up on this week.

“We need to be able to handle a kicking game against us, it was evident last year when we played the Brumbies they put us under immense pressure with tactical and contestable kicks on our back three and then likewise at the breakdown with Pocock and co.

“We are keen to keep improving and we are going to continue on the path that we have chosen, we are looking forward to this weekend,” he added.