Manie for Sacha a necessary ‘risk’

John Dobson is worried about tinkering with the Stormers lineup close to the Vodacom URC playoffs, but backs Salmaan Moerat to steady the ship against Cardiff on Friday night.

The Stormers chief fields a much-changed side for their final Vodacom URC league fixture at Cape Town Stadium, showing 10 personnel changes and two positional switches to the starting XV that thumped Dragons last week.

Dobson, though, is confident in the mix of experience and talent at his disposal for a match that could determine the Capetonians’ playoff seeding.

“Despite the amount of changes it didn’t take us too long to choose, and there were a couple of imperatives. First imperative was what we needed to win this week, and the intensity we needed. That’s where someone like Salmaan is really important,” said Dobson during Thursday’s team announcement.

“The second thing was looking at guys who probably put a lot into this union, who won’t play in this stadium again in our colours. So there’s a sort of nod to that but not the overriding thing.

“And then thirdly, we are going to be in a playoff and there are some guys with one or two niggles… Evan Roos and Ali Vermaak, for example. Those are guys I’m not sure that we could afford to be without in the playoffs.”

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Skipper Moerat, one of only five players retained in the run-on team along with Damian Willemse, Wandi Simelane, Marcel Theunissen and Joseph Dweba, added: “I feel confident, actually very confident, to be honest. If you go through the list of players who are playing, someone like Scarra [Ntubeni] has been there before and played in far bigger games than these, he knows what it takes.

“Neetas [Neethling Fouche] is back, he’s one of our leaders.. There will be the challenge of new combinations, which is natural and normal, and we’ll probably make a few mistakes out there, but I have absolutely no doubt that the guys will fight for each other and we’ll be up for it.”

The return of Libbok, who has been sidelined since January with a knee injury, in the No 10 jumper sees the sensational Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu relegated to the bench.

Dobson acknowledged the risk of disrupting momentum with so many changes but explained the reasoning behind starting Libbok.

“Losing momentum is a concern, so there’s a risk to this, what we’re doing tomorrow. We’re a little bit worried about that. Also because the team is in such a good space, and it’s been pretty consistent,” Dobson said.

“But we have to play Manie. We’d like to keep Sacha’s innings going and flow but the fact is, if Sacha is injured or out, Manie won’t have played at all. 

“Manie has to become eligible so he has to play, and to control his game time and long-term injury, he has to start. If Sacha went down in the fifth minute, Manie can’t play 75, so we’d be in trouble.”

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The Stormers enter the final round of URC league action looking to secure fifth place on the log after three consecutive bonus-point victories. They could face an away quarter-final against Glasgow if the defending champions lose to Leinster and slip to fourth.

Dobson highlighted the importance of securing at least one log point, while wary of the challenge posed by a Cardiff side still fighting for a playoff spot.

“If you look at the kick-off times that we play it, compared to some other teams around the country, it’s a tricky thing when it gets to this time of year. I don’t like a 7 o’clock kick-off, and it’s potentially Cardiff’s last game so they’re going to be in knockout mode,” he said.

“We absolutely have to get a point out of the game. Obviously we want far more but we talked about it, and don’t want to run the risk of finishing eighth. It’s going to be a little bit like a knockout game, not that we designed it like that.

“We’re still going to go for the quickest way of making sure we’re not finishing eighth, and that’s getting the four tries, isn’t it? But we’re also not going to let a team beat us by more than seven, that’s for sure.”

Photo: Ashley Vlotman/Gallo Images