25 October 2026
DHL Stormers Director of Rugby John Dobson has warned his side against complacency after a chaotic second-half collapse nearly cost them a 52-40 United Rugby Championship victory over the Scarlets at DHL Stadium. Despite running in eight tries in a breathless 14-try thriller, the hosts leaked six of their own as a commanding 33-14 half-time lead completely evaporated.
The Welsh tourists capitalised on a leaky home defence after the break, stringing together clinical phases to level the score at 40-40. Dobson praised the visitors' tactical enterprise while slamming his own squad's mental drop-off. “Halftime there wasn’t much hope for them,” Dobson noted. “But the way they played deserved credit. You could see they were getting hope after the break. We weren’t direct enough, and a couple of years ago we would’ve lost that.”
The Stormers mentor stressed that his team must eradicate the habit of switching off when playing international opposition outside of high-stakes local derbies. “I don’t want us to be a team that becomes a bit too loose because we think we might not be playing one of the best sides in the URC or it is not a local derby,” Dobson insisted. “We got a bit like that today, and we must nip it in the bud.”
Faced with a late-game disaster, the Capetonians rallied with two late tries from replacement Yaqeen Ahmed to wrestle back control. The hosts then put in a massive defensive shift to deny the Scarlets a historic comeback victory in the dying moments. “I thought actually the way we closed it, we were in ascendancy for the last 10 minutes, which was remarkable,” Dobson concluded. “The way we defended at the end there, it was probably our best period of defence.”