Stormers winger Bryan Habana scored a late try and flyhalf Peter Grant kicked 18 points to secure a 23-13 win over the Bulls on Saturday in an all-South African Super rugby game.
It was the Stormers’ fourth win in a row and leaves them as the only unbeaten team in the Southern Hemisphere provincial competition, which was expanded to 15 teams this year.
“We were under a lot of pressure this week from the media but we know what we’re doing in the squad,” said Stormers captain Jean de Villiers.
“To come up here and win is so special and something we haven’t done in a long time.”
Grant, who kicked all 39 of his team’s points in their most recent wins over the Cheetahs and Highlanders, continued his rich vein of form with six penalties in what was a repeat of last year’s Super 14 final.
In a rain-affected match the visitors translated their early ascendancy at scrum time into three goals by Grant to give them a 9-0 lead after 21 minutes.
Grant, capped five times by South Africa but never given a start in a Test, signalled his World Cup intentions with a classy tactical display that kept the Bulls pinned back in their own half for much of the first period.
Penalised
The Bulls, whose 20-match home winning streak was ended by Otago Highlanders two weeks ago, were heavily penalised at the breakdown and had to rely on the boot of flyhalf Morne Steyn to get them on the board on the half-hour.
Winger Bjorn Basson then got the home side back in contention when he was freed down the left-hand touchline from a full backline move before chipping over the scrambling defence.
Covering Stormers winger Habana slipped in the in-goal area and Basson was on hand to dot down for Steyn to convert.
But it was Grant who extended the Stormers’ lead to eight points with his fifth and sixth penalties in the 47th and 53rd minutes as the Bulls continued to infringe on the ground.
Steyn kept his stuttering side in the hunt with a second penalty three minutes later, which sparked a raft of substitutions from both sides.
But it was Springbok winger Habana who provided the match-winning moment, making amends for his earlier mistake by beating Basson to a chip-ahead in the 70th to give his team their first win in Pretoria in eight years.
“It was very frustrating,” said Bulls skipper Victor Matfield. “We made too many mistakes and didn’t play well.” – Reuters