Mike Greenaway
The United Rugby Championship heads into its last round before the play-offs this weekend and while many a team have been tapping at their calculators, the Lions have tossed theirs in the bin.
They know that nothing short of a five-point harvest against the Stormers at the Cape Town Stadium will do, if they are to nail down position seven on the overall ladder.
The Lions are ninth going into round 18 and their task of qualifying for the play-offs was made tougher when eighth place was made redundant by the Sharks’ EPCR Challenge Cup final defeat of Gloucester.
That means the pack of midfield teams fighting for a position in the play-offs has had the cut-off moved from eighth place to seventh.
The Lions have understandably hyped their visit to the Stormers as a final and that makes sense in that they have effectively been in play-off mode for some time, and their defeats of Benetton and the Glasgow Warriors in Joburg amount to play-off wins.
In their last outing, the Lions’ victory over a Glasgow team that had been No 1 in the standings sent a shock wave through the tournament and it has given the Lions the belief that they can beat anyone on their day.
The Lions have a recent history of beating the Stormers in Cape Town and if they surprise the home side and other results go their way, they will secure a place in the quarter-finals.
The Lions are ninth with 49 points. Ahead of them on the log, and also fighting to make the top seven, are Benetton (eighth, 49), Edinburgh (seventh, 49), and Ulster (sixth, 53).
Adding spice to the weekend finish is the fact that Benetton and Edinburgh will clash in Treviso, while Ulster are away to Munster, who are now the log leaders.
Lions coach Ivan van Rooyen says his team can only control what is in front of them.
“We’re just going to have to stick to our processes and enjoy a great occasion in Cape Town,” he said.
“The Stormers are an exceptional team with lots of X-factor and if we allow them to show that, they will punish us. We’ll have a good look at how we want to take them on.”
The Stormers are in a confident mood after winning both of their recent matches abroad — they are fifth on the points table, six off fourth-placed Glasgow and cannot move into the top four.