Stormers 'inconsistency' is not a mystery

Perhaps the most appropriate sponsor for the Vodacom Stormers would be the makers of the roller-coaster ride that you find in theme parks around the world. You know, the one that has you reaching into the clouds one minute, and then plunging towards earth the next.

Questions about the Stormers’ inconsistency has become the talking point of Cape rugby since they beat the Blues at Newlands, so keeping intact a quite bizarre sequence of loss/win results that now extends back to late February. Instead of celebrating the fine victory over the Blues, many are asking “Why can’t they play like that every week?”

Indeed, if you look at their statistics since the opening win of the season against the Chiefs, you might suggest that it is not the manufacturers of roller-coaster that should be sponsoring them, but the Milnerton lighthouse – one minute there is light, the next minute it is dark, one minute there is light, the next it is dark…

Allied to these questions have been ones about the Stormers’ apparent inability to front up to the Bulls. While the Crusaders and the Blues have been beaten during the course of the past year through good planning, strategy and quite a bit of skill, the Bulls have crunched the Stormers in their last three meetings.

The first question, the one about the Bulls, might be a lot easier to answer than the second one. In short, it is starting to become apparent that the problem the players face when they play the Bulls is as much psychological as it is physical.

This is the only way to explain why the same forwards who dominated a Blues pack which featured several All Blacks were so ineffectual against the Bulls the previous week.

Coach Kobus van der Merwe goes along with the theory that the Stormers players may have too much respect for individuals in the Bulls line-up. When they see the Blues, they just see the Blues team, but when they see the Bulls, they see Bakkies Botha and Victor Matfield and others, and are intimidated by these characters.

If this is the reason for the Stormers’ regular tame capitulations to the Bulls, it might be completely explainable. The 75-14 defeat at Loftus, which happened in the last game of Gert Smal’s stint as Stormers coach, is going to live on in the subconscious of those who played in that game for some time to come.

Western Province appeared to break the hold slightly when they won a Currie Cup match in Pretoria last year, but this might just illustrate the point rather than debunk it – the Blue Bulls team that day were without Matfield, Botha, Danie Rossouw and others who have been part of the Bulls hegemony over their Cape rivals in the Super 14.

If that answers the question on why the Bulls currently enjoy a hold over the Stormers, why is that a Stormers victory over the Reds this coming weekend would be the first time they have won in successive rounds?

This might also not be the mystery many are making it out to be. For analytical purposes, the Stormers season should be divided into separate sections. The first one was the opening two game sequence against the Cheetahs and the Western Force, the real dark patch of the season.

The Stormers lost these games because, as was argued at the time, the coach was relying too heavily on both the playing personnel and the strategies that got WP into last year’s Currie Cup semifinals. The defences were more organised in the Super 14, and players such as Naas Olivier and Gio Aplon, stars in the domestic competition, were found wanting.

The start of the next phase was when Van der Merwe saw the light, and it was not coincidence that the first Stormers win of the season, against the Chiefs, coincided with the arrival of Peter Grant as the flyhalf and the selection of Conrad Jantjes at fullback (although he pulled out shortly before the game to be replaced by Brent Russell).

Since the Chiefs game there has been a sequence of win/loss, win/loss which has been well documented, but in reality the only matches in this new phase where the Stormers have really disappointed were the ones against the Highlanders, which was the first of their New Zealand tour, and the Bulls.

Up until the Highlanders game the Stormers appeared to be suffering a confidence crisis, but their big win over the Hurricanes the following week changed that. They lost to the Brumbies in Canberra in the next game simply because they made mistakes early in the match that cost them against a side you simply cannot play catch-up against.

Their other game was against Crusaders in Christchurch. The Stormers lost by some distance on the scoreboard, but they competed well on the field, mixing it with the Crusaders, who were at full strength, most of the way.

So if you look at the bare bones of it, and look at the season in sequential fashion, the big mysteries may not be particularly mysterious.