Cape Town– Although Nic White is the shortest player in the Brumbies line-up, he will be key to Super Rugby’s most prodigious line-out in the encounter with the Stormers at Newlands.
“The Brumbies are a structured side,” said Stormers coach Allister Coetzee.
“They’ve scored most of their tries from structured or set-piece play. We’ll have to make sure we’re accurate in terms of what’s coming because they’ve scored something like 15 of their 19 set-piece tries from the line-out. But only when they’re in their opponents’ 40.”
White defers to few Super Rugby scrum-halves in the kicking game, and if he successfully conducts an aerial campaign against the Stormers, players like Nic Groom, Demetri Catrakilis and Cheslin Kolbe will have to reply with relieving kicks that bring the Brumbies line-out within try-line range.
White has not lost against the Stormers, but the Stormers have not lost at Newlands with referee Stuart Berry on the whistle. One of these streaks is almost certain to come to an end today.
Because Super Rugby’s governing body has instructed referees to play the role of “story-teller”, mandating them to deliver the game “that people want to see”, the referee’s identity is often viewed as a crucial piece of information in the lead-up to a clash between teams with authentic play-off aspirations.
For example, in six away matches controlled by Craig Joubert, before last week’s trip to Bloemfontein, the Stormers did not win. They went down 25-17 against the Cheetahs for their seventh successive road loss under the Durban-born referee.
Berry has officiated at three Super Rugby matches at Newlands and the Stormers have won all of them. And this may give Coetzee a boost of confidence that his Stormers will rein in the Brumbies to climb back into first place in the South African conference.
However, White may trump the Berry factor. The Wallabies halfback has faced and beaten the Stormers only once, but what tells a story is how the Western Cape side have fared against the Brumbies – and other opponents – when a scrum-half of White’s particular set of skills is absent.
Although he made his Super Rugby debut in 2011, White missed a 16-3 loss against the Stormers in Canberra that year, as well as the next engagement between the two sides, a 35-22 win for the hosts at Newlands.
White was at No 9 when the Brumbies beat the Stormers 25-15 in Australia last year, and it was the hefty contribution made by his right boot that denied the tourists.
In 611 minutes of action this season, White has put boot to ball 45 times. In comparison, Groom has completed 26 kicks out of hand in 647 minutes.
More than the sheer volume of kicks, it is the consistent quality of White’s tactical game that has earned him 19 Wallaby caps.
Last year, the reverse in Canberra marked one of 10 games in which the Stormers were out-kicked, and they lost eight of them. It has been an area of vulnerability first exposed by the Reds’ tactical halfback tandem of Will Genia and Quade Cooper, who pinned the Stormers back for a 19-6 win at Newlands in 2011.
The Brumbies are well known for engaging teams in a long-range kicking duel, but the Stormers’ line-out has been so poor that White will have no compunction about hoofing the ball out of play.
Manuel Carizza and Eben Etzebeth are the Stormers’ third lock partnership in as many weeks, while the Brumbies boast a more than 2-metre-tall contester in rookie jumper Rory Arnold.
The recipe seems simple: kick deep to contest a disjointed line-out and force the Stormers to attempt to execute their exit strategy.
But Berry may yet prove to be an unwitting ace up Coetzee’s sleeve.
Brumbies flankers Scott Fardy and David Pocock are the big guns in a defensive breakdown routine that has contributed to harvesting the third-most turnovers in Super Rugby this season.
Only one player has pinched more ball than fetcher Pocock (15) and blindsider Fardy isn’t far behind with 11 steals. Fardy’s real value lies in tanking the breakdown, powering through the ruck to create mayhem and slow the speed of the recycle.
Together, they are a formidable breakdown threat, but fetching and tanking are skills that are executed on the periphery of the laws of the game.
Berry’s decision-making profile in three categories includes awarding almost 75 percent of his penalties in each match against the defending team, more than half against the visiting team, and almost half for transgressions at the breakdown.
Coetzee can easily bring the referee into the game by saddling up a direct ground attack with Etzebeth, Duane Vermeulen and Siya Kolisi thundering into Brumbies tacklers and inviting Pocock and Fardy to cross Berry’s line.
Breakdown penalties in favour of the Stormers will give them free exits, move the Brumbies line-out out of striking distance, and reduce White’s role to one of kicking to relieve the pressure on the tourists, rather than turning it up on the hosts. - Saturday Star