Full house in London for DHL Stormers
The DHL Stormers scored four tries on their way to a 28-14 bonus-point win against London Irish in their Heineken Champions Cup encounter at the Gtech Community Stadium on Sunday.
In a game dominated by the two red cards shown to London Irish, the DHL Stormers did enough to claim all the points on offer as they head back to Cape Town where they will face ASM Clermont Auvergne next week.
The DHL Stormers absorbed some early pressure before applying some of their own and it paid off when a strong maul was pulled down, resulting in a penalty try.
The backline looked to have scored a scintillating try shortly afterwards, but the last pass to Angelo Davids was called back for a forward pass.
Manie Libbok made that pass, but was then hit late and high by London Irish fullback Ben Loader, who was shown a red card.
Ruhan Nel made the initial linebreak for that effort and he was on the scoresheet before long, making a great read on defence to grab an intercept and race away.
The third try came on the stroke of half-time as Libbok’s replacement Sacha-Feinberg-Mngomezulu put a kick through for Suleiman Hartzenberg to grab and step inside to score.
That saw the DHL Stormers go into half-time with a 21-0 lead and needing just one try in the second half to secure the bonus point.
London Irish were down to 13 when replacement prop Ciaran Parker was shown red early in the second half.
The DHL Stormers did not take long to secure the bonus point, with Davids getting on the end of a kick through from Dan du Plessis to score.
The home team got on the scoreboard with a penalty try of their own, which also saw DHL Stormers skipper Steven Kitshoff shown a yellow card.
The rest of the second half was quite scrappy, with the home team eventually getting over for their second try from replacement prop Danilo Fischetti.
The DHL Stormers looked to have ended with a try, but Nel lost control of the ball as he went to ground it.
The scorers:
For DHL Stormers:
Tries: Penalty try, Nel, Hartzenberg, Davids
Cons: Feinberg-Mngomezulu 3
For London Irish:
Tries: Penalty try, Fischetti
Con: Jennings
DHL Stormers: 15 Damian Willemse, 14 Suleiman Hartzenberg, 13 Ruhan Nel, 12 Dan du Plessis, 11 Angelo Davids, 10 Manie Libbok, 9 Paul de Wet, 8 Hacjivah Dayimani, 7 Junior Pokomela, 6 Deon Fourie, 5 Marvin Orie, 4 Connor Evans, 3 Neethling Fouche, 2 Joseph Dweba, 1 Steven Kitshoff (captain).
Replacements: 16 Andre-Hugo Venter, 17 Ali Vermaak, 18 Brok Harris, 19 Simon Miller, 20 Ben-Jason Dixon, 21 Willie Engelbrecht, 22 Stefan Ungerer, 23 Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu.
London Irish: 15 Ben Loader, 14 Lucio Cinti, 13 Luca Morisi, 12 Benhard van Rensburg, 11 Ollie Hassell-Collins, 10 Rory Jennings, 9 Ben White, 1 Will Goodrick-Clarke, 2 Mike Willemse, 3 Lovejoy Chawatama, 4 Api Ratuniyarawa, 5 Rob Simmons, 6 Juan Martin Gonzalez, 7 Tom Pearson, 8 Matt Rogerson (c)
Replacements: 16 Ignacio Ruiz, 17 Danilo Fischetti, 18 Ciaran Parker, 19 Chunya Munga, 20 Josh Basham, 21 Chandler Cunningham-South, 22 Joe Powell, 23 Michael Dykes.
