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Siya Kolisi (captain) of the Stormers breaks free from Andre Warner of the Lions and scores a try during Saturday’s SuperFan match between Emirates Lions and DHL Stormers at Loftus Versfeld Stadium on September 26, 2020 in Pretoria, South Africa. (Photo by Sydney Seshibedi / Gallo Images)
- Stormers Siya Kolisi praised the determination of his teammates by inspiring him to score what was arguably the decisive try in his encounter with the Lions at Loftus.
- The national captain admitted that he thought about finishing the first half quickly before a cheeky Herschel Jantjies made him change his mind.
- Coach John Dobson felt that his pupils might have been lucky to hold out as the challenge of altitude started to hurt. but he expressed how proud he was.
Sometimes even the strongest leader needs to be encouraged by his delegates to continue.
That was certainly the case with He is a school and his Stormers at Saturday’s Super Fan event meeting with the Lions in Loftus, where the enthusiasm of his teammates led him to test the halftime horn that gave the Capetonians enough buffer to defeat their rapidly finishing opponents.
Fatigue from months of not being exposed to altitude training weighed heavily on the Stormers’ minds prior to the game and, after an excellent forward-driven effort in the first half that overwhelmed the outgunned Lions, Kolisi was content to finish. quickly procedures at the end of the first 40.
“I almost kicked him,” admitted the national captain after a 34-21 victory.
“But I had (Bok’s runner) Herschel (Jantjies) yelling at me: ‘Are you crazy? ‘ (Are you crazy?).”
The Stormers then proceeded to deliver a three-minute period of sumptuous attacking play, belying how their lungs were actually on fire from Highveld’s thin air.
It culminated in Kolisi’s powerful run on the right sideline, where he struck Lions scrum-half Andre Warner with a dismissive hand to cross the white line.
The 29-year-old openider could barely get up afterwards.
I was exhausted.
“To be honest, there was absolutely nothing on my mind at the time. I was squatting when the ball came back to me. I just summoned a reaction, I just got energy from somewhere and went (towards the test line),” Kolisi said .
“I knew something had to be done after all the work we did during that step of the game. I was as hard as I could.”
As much as it was Kolisi who earned the applause for his initiative, he noted that the effort was absolutely due to the Stormers’ ironclad desire to go ahead and play for each other.
“The whole sequence cheered me up. We could have kicked, but the guys really wanted to play, even against a Lions team at altitude that normally takes control and dominates at the end of the halves,” he said.
“We move on.”
John Dobson, the Stormers head coach, was also pleased with the character displayed by his positions despite the fact that a late attempt to replace scrum-half Paul de Wet inflated a lead that seemed tenuous for a long time during the second half.
“The Lions were good, they pushed us a lot later with that new team they brought in while we were tired,” he said.
“We didn’t bring in 30 players because we wanted some of them to play the full 80 minutes and the Lions almost caught us. I thought we were very lucky to hold out, but we showed a reasonable amount of character.
“Spending 80 minutes at altitude after a wet winter in the Cape and getting a result makes me proud of Siya and the team.”
