While the Stormers are still hurting from losing their long winning streak to the Bulls, scrumhalf Herschel Jantjies has called on the Cape side to put their best foot forward against Edinburgh this weekend.
The South African teams come off a three-week break in the United Rugby Championship, and the Stormers would have had a lot to ponder on following their 40-22 defeat to the Bulls in Pretoria on March 2.
Despite not playing their best rugby before the Loftus Versfeld clash, the Stormers had been on a six-match winning run from the 21-20 December Champions Cup victory over La Rochelle at the Cape Town Stadium, which was followed by wins over the Bulls, Sharks, Sale, Stade Francais and the Sharks again.
Stormers coach John Dobson stated this week that his side have some hard work ahead of them to climb up the URC log over the next few weeks, as they are currently ninth on 30 points.
After the Edinburgh clash at Cape Town Stadium on Saturday (5.05pm kick-off), they will face a testing encounter against Ulster – who have Steven Kitshoff in their squad – at the same venue a week later, before a rematch with La Rochelle in the Champions Cup last-16 play-off on April 6 in the Mother City.
The 27-year-old Jantjies is banking on the home crowd’s support to propel the Stormers into their best shape after a hard day in Pretoria a few weeks ago.
“It’s always special to play at home – the vibe, everyone knows by now, is amazing. It gives us that extra edge over other teams. We all saw the turnout at Loftus. The result didn’t go our way, but it was an amazing (atmosphere),” the Springbok halfback said.
“If we can have close to a full stadium again, it would be amazing. Hopefully we can reward the people with quality and get the result.
“There is always room for improvement, and I think we’ve addressed some stuff that we need to work on. It’s a nice challenge for us, and hopefully we can rectify those challenges.
“We’ve worked really hard over the last week, and going into this week, we’ve started off well.
“Going to Loftus, there was a lot of stuff before the game that was out of our control – the game starting late and stuff (due to adverse weather conditions) – which is obviously not an excuse.
“But there were a lot of things that happened that I think we could’ve controlled a lot better, stuff that we as players can sort out.
“Also, getting a start. I don’t think we started off too well. We stuck in well for the way that we started, but towards the back end, the Bulls sort of ran away with the game.
“A lot of technical stuff that we can work on, which we did. Last week (against Northampton in England in a friendly) was really insightful for us, and a big learning for us. In future, it is something that we shouldn’t stumble upon again.”
Dobson explained that some of the shortcomings Jantjies was referring to were also down to “coaching detail” around maul defence and the line-outs against the Bulls, and that those issues had been addressed over the last few weeks.
Jantjies won’t have to face Scottish international scrumhalf Ali Price – who is unavailable this week due to the impending birth of his child – but the Edinburgh backline still boast threats all around the pitch.
Edinburgh coach Sean Everitt is still waiting to see if giant Test wing Duhan van der Merwe will be cleared to travel to South Africa for the Stormers game after he played against Ireland in the Six Nations last weekend, along with six other internationals.
But the Stormers have their own Springbok backline firepower in the shape of Manie Libbok and Damian Willemse, as well as a number of others who were invited to the recent national team alignment camp in Cape Town, such as Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu.
“Going into the last few games, it’s a perfect time for us to measure the stuff that we’ve been talking about and execute,” said Jantjies, who recently welcomed the birth of his daughter, Alyssa-Rose, and has 24 Bok caps.
“I don’t think we are too (far) off. Like Dobbo said, it feels like we are getting our spark back. Hopefully we can continue with that and be even better this week than our last game.”