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What a match! It’s been too long since Stormers supporters could come together and cheer on our boytjies at the DHL Stadium. Tonight, the Stormers produced a magnificent second-half comeback to claim a narrow victory over the Vodacom Bulls and win the inaugural Vodacom United Rugby Championship in Cape Town. Tonight, the stadium overflowed with passion, pride and triumph – even the rain could not dampen our spirits.

Having trailed by four points after a tightly contested first half, the Stormers came out firing in the second and took advantage of a perhaps travel-wary Bulls outfit to power to a 18-13 victory in the URC’s grand final.

So often known as South Africa’s bridesmaids, with their tendency to stumble in the playoffs, the Stormers finally gave their faithful the silverware they had been craving for decades, with their very first major continental title win.

For the Bulls, they will be looking back on their dominant period in the first half and wondering what could have been had they been more clinical with their first-half assault.

Part of the reason the Stormers were able to withstand the onslaught was due to Deon Fourie. The veteran flanker was playing in his 100th game for the Cape side and made his presence felt at the breakdown, making turnover after turnover when the hosts were under pressure.

Also read: Veteran Stormers star Deon Fourie seeks revenge against Bulls

The Bulls made an electric start to the final when two powerful driving mauls resulted in inside centre Harold Vorster powering his way over the tryline for the opening score just two minutes into the contest.

Despite coming immense pressure, the Stormers did their best to hang in there and started clawing their back into the contest from the 30-minute mark. Warrick Gelant started seeing more of the ball and with that came better territorial dominance.

While Manie Libbok missed his first attempt on goal, he held his nerve to slot his second attempt just after the half-time hooter had sounded. The Stormers took this momentum into the second half and while Chris Smith slotted his second penalty just two minutes into the half, Evan Roos reached over and Libbok converted to level the scores at 10-10.

The Stormers continued to apply pressure through Gelant’s boot and it started to tell as Cornal Hendricks was yellow carded for a dangerous tackle on Ruhan Nel. That provided the home side with the advantage they needed as they produced a powerful maul of their own to allow replacement hooker Andre-Hugo Venter to score.

Smith’s third penalty narrowed the deficit to just two points. In the most ironic of circumstances, while the Bulls were prepped to send veteran flyhalf Morne Steyn on, himself a matchwinner on his day, it was Libbok who slotted the drop goal which gave the Stormers the buffer they needed to see out the game and claim the title.

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