The Stormers were the only unbeaten team in the Super Rugby competition until Saturday when they were taken out of their comfort zone by the Reds at Newlands.

That was the succinct summary offered by Stormers coach Allister Coetzee after the Reds put an abrupt end to his teams’s six-game unbeaten run by beating them 19-6 at Newlands on Saturday.

The decision-making of the Reds halfback pair, Quade Cooper and Will Genia, the accurate passing of Cooper in particular, and the Reds ability to turn the Stormers around by kicking the ball behind them were key factors in the Stormers first defeat at Newlands since the early season loss to the Brumbies last year.

The Reds had pitched up with the right attitude, they were tactically good, kicking for territory far better than the Stormers, and their defence was tight, said Coetzee.

The home team had made life difficult for themselves, he added, by their inability to hold on to the ball and by losing two players to yellow cards.

“We were obviously very disappointed by our own performance,” said Coetzee.

“I must give credit to the Reds; they played really well. We didn’t adapt well on the day. They got behind us with Quade Cooper’s excellent. accurate passing ability and they turned us with tactical kicking behind us which was difficult to contain and to play from there. They thoroughly deserved the win.”

Coetzee lauded Cooper and Genia as decision-makers. He said the Reds had succeeded in “taking us out of our comfort zone with our defensive system by running at us and giving Quade a bit of space and time”.

“It’s difficult to handle that passing game of his and tactically they kicked more than they normally do. Defensively they’re also a strong side. They’ve got the highest tackle completion in this competition. Credit to them for doing their homework so well.”

Coetzee said the Reds physical intensity had taken the Stormers by surprise and they had been dominant at breakdown.

“We just battled to get going. We were forced into making those mistakes. These are lessons we’ve got to learn and take along with us.

“We know where we went wrong. Our execution is one of the things that definitely wasn’t good and obviously it doesn’t help to play for 20 minutes with 14 men.

“I mentioned their blocking and pulling and holding on during the week and I just don’t think we reacted well to that. We had a plan to handle it but we didn’t handle it well. It’s yet again a learning curve for us.

“Tactically they kicked far better than we did. In all departments we weren’t good – in defence, on attack, and in the kicking game; it wasn’t good at all. We struggled with our execution; we struggled to hold the ball thorough phases.

“The bounce of the ball didn’t go our way. If you don’t get front-foot ball it’s difficult to play the game. They got width in their passing game, they got behind us and pinned us down in our own 22.”

Stormers captain Schalk Burger commented that it was “one of those games when we couldn’t get anything going”. He believed they had lost to the better team on the day.

“In this competition if you’re five percent off your game you lose the match. We didn’t get any rhythm going. Every time we started running the ball we turned it over and that put us under a lot of pressure,” Burger said, adding that playing for 20 minutes with seven forwards had made it tough, especially defensively.

But it was not all doom and gloom in the Stormers camp.

“We take it on the chin, hats off to the Reds, and we move on,” said Coetzee.

“We’ve got to take the lessons from this game. It’s important how the Stormers players will react to this. That to me is the big question to answer.

“This is not the first time we’ve been in this situation. We lost to the Brumbies at Newlands in the Super 14 last year and we reacted well. We came back strongly – especially in the game after the Brumbies when we gained our first bonus point [by beating the Highlanders 33-0] and that’s the reaction I want to see next week when we go up to the Lions.”

Source + Pic: rugby365.com