Will bold selection decisions pay off or implode for Stormers against Glasgow?

Stormers Director of Rugby John Dobson has made some bold selection decisions for their United Rugby Championship (URC) playoff game against Glasgow Warriors at the Scotstoun Stadium on Friday night (kick-off 8:35pm).

Key among them was the call to not play Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu and Manie Libbok together, even though the unfortunate suspension to star Damian Willemse completely opened the door for it.

Instead, Dobson opted to return Feinberg-Mngomezulu to flyhalf, after playing off the bench in their last game against Cardiff, while Libbok who had started at 10 in that match on his return from injury, was dropped to the bench.

Scintillating form

If Willemse had been available for the quarterfinal, this would not have been a surprising call, as Feinberg-Mngomezulu has been in absolutely scintillating form recently, and has driven a lot of the Stormers’ superb play during their stunning end of pool stage run that saw them win six out of seven games.

But with the double World Cup winning Springbok unavailable, it was expected that Feinberg-Mngomezulu would start at inside centre, while Libbok would hold on to the No 10 jersey after an impressive 55 minutes on his return from injury against Cardiff.

So it came as a surprise when the team was released and Feinberg-Mngomezulu was at flyhalf, and the solid Dan du Plessis at inside centre, with Dobson explaining that it had been a difficult decision.

“That did take a lot of talking through, and discussion around what we think we need for this game. We did consider playing Manie and Sacha together. Sacha and Damian are so alike, so there was a very strong argument for starting them both,” said Dobson.

“But then we had to consider other things, and in the end we had to consider that this would be less disruptive to the team. Sacha has been doing well at flyhalf and we have had a nice rhythm to our game.

“We still have Sacha and Manie, with Manie on the bench. Manie can come on later in the game and then Sacha can go where he is needed.”

Hartzenberg decision

Another surprising call was young Suleiman Hartzenberg, who has featured mainly on the wing for the Stormers and scored two tries in that position against Cardiff, being named at outside centre for the match, which is admittedly a position he sees himself playing in the future.

Wandisile Simelane has also been superb for the Stormers at 13 recently, and is very unlucky to miss out, but Dobson admitted that the nature of the 4G pitch that they will be playing on swung the decision in Hartzenberg’s favour, even though he isn’t completely sure on whether it is the correct call.

“We looked at the opposition, we looked at how we want to defend and we looked at the surface. The way Suleiman played two weeks ago, admittedly on the wing, was excellent,” explained Dobson.

“And it’s not really a stepping kind of surface (which Simelane is known for). You need someone who can work back. We’ve got some tweaks to our defence where we think Suleiman will be really useful. Some plans around the aerial game. So it’s a horses for courses selection.

“But in terms of do I think he’s got enough games there under the belt? Probably not ideally, but you can’t account for injuries and suspensions. We think this is the best team we can put out.”