DHL Stormers go down fighting in Paris

Yesterday at 04:59 PM

The DHL Stormers fought hard until the end, but went down 31-22 in their Investec Champions Cup clash with Racing 92 in Paris on Saturday evening.

It was an entertaining clash at the La Defence Arena, with the home side outscoring the DHL Stormers by five tries to three on the night.

The visitors dominated the opening exchanges, camping in the 22 until Jurie Matthee opened the scoring with an early penalty.

Racing 92 responded with two quick tries from either wing to take control of the match.

Joseph Dweba was forced to leave the field with a shoulder injury and his replacement Andre-Hugo Venter took the field and scored immediately from a maul to bring the DHL Stormers right back into it at 12-10 down.

However, the hosts had the final say in the first half as a quick line-out saw left wing Vinayo Habosi go over for his second try.

Racing were reduced to 14 when their captain Ibrahim Diallo was shown a yellow card for a cynical infringement, but the DHL Stormers were unable to capitalise as the resulting line-out was stolen to send the French side into the break with a 19-10 advantage.

It took 15 minutes of second half action for the first try after the break, with wing Max Spring finishing out wide for the home side.

Herschel Jantjies came on at scrumhalf and provided the spark to put Matthee through a gap before running a good support line to score between the poles.

The DHL Stormers kept fighting and a snipe from the base by Jantjies saw flank Marcel Theunissen go over for the third try, which reduced Racing’s lead to 24-22 heading into the last 15 minutes.

However, a late try from Boris Palu sealed the win for the home side.

The scorers:

For DHL Stormers:
Tries: Venter, Jantjies, Theunissen
Cons: Matthee 2
Pen: Matthee

For Racing 92:
Tries: Habosi 2, Spring 2, Palu
Cons: Le Garrec 3

DHL Stormers: 15 Clayton Blommetjies, 14 Suleiman Hartzenberg, 13 Wandisile Simelane, 12 Jonathan Roche, 11 Ben Loader, 10 Jurie Matthee, 9 Dewaldt Duvenage, 8 Evan Roos, 7 Marcel Theunissen, 6 Willie Engelbrecht, 5 Ruben van Heerden, 4 Salmaan Moerat (captain), 3 Neethling Fouche, 2 Joseph Dweba, 1 Sti Sithole.
Replacements: 16 Andre-Hugo Venter, 17 Ali Vermaak, 18 Frans Malherbe, 19 JD Schickerling, 20 Dave Ewers, 21 Paul de Villiers, 22 Herschel Jantjies, 23 Jean-Luc du Plessis.

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