Stormers director of rugby John Dobson revealed that his side had a useful exchange with the Springbok coaching staff ahead of Friday’s clash with the All Blacks, with the Cape side now set to provide informal feedback to the world champions after their 38-21 defeat.
Dobson said the discussions with Rassie Erasmus and his coaching staff were part of a growing alignment between the South African teams and the Springboks ahead of Rugby’s Greatest Rivalry.
While the Cape side fought for 65 minutes against the world’s second-ranked side, they eventually ran out of steam in the opening clash of the tour. Despite that, they put in a valiant and emotion-filled performance in front of over 47 000 supporters.
According to Dobson, they’ll likely have a chat with the Springbok coaches about the intel they picked up from Friday’s encounter.
“We (the Stormers and Bok coaches) had a chat last week, just normal alignment. I think it’s quite clever and I’ll probably give feedback (on the match). There will be, but nothing formal,” Dobson said after Friday’s battle.
“But we are South African teams and I think they’d be interested to know how we experienced the clash, I know they will. So we’ll give some feedback on what we found. I don’t think that’s unusual, but yeah, we shared some thoughts during the week and it actually was really useful. It’s a nice alignment between us and the Springboks.
“They pointed out a few things, ‘Have you thought about this, watched this?’ And we said we’ve noticed this, picked this something up, and they said thanks for it. That’s cool, it feels like we haven’t done that before, so that (discussion) was nice, yeah.”
The Stormers’ experience against the All Blacks could now provide valuable learnings for the Boks, who will face New Zealand in the first Test of the four-match series in a couple of weeks in Johannesburg.
They will face the Sharks and Bulls this coming week, and the two franchises should also return to the world champions with some inside information ahead of the Ellis Park opener on 22 August.
Dobson believes the exchange had already proved worthwhile, with the Springbok coaches giving information that helped the Stormers prepare for Friday’s clash. His side dominated in the scrums and rolling mauls, which was a pleasing sight for Cape supporters.
“They gave us two really good things, one of which came to fruition on Friday,” he added.
For the Springboks, the Stormers’ first-hand experience could offer another useful piece of information as they prepare for what promises to be a bruising series against their greatest rivals. More information from the Sharks and Bulls could put the world champions at an early advantage ahead of the opening Test in Johannesburg.
