'He blew his nose and his eye didn't pop out, but it was a horrible one'

Stormers head coach John Dobson admitted that his team missed Deon Fourie’s influence in their Champions Cup quarterfinal against Exeter Chiefs on Saturday.

The Capetonians were outplayed in all facets of the game on their way to a 17-42 defeat at Sandy Park.

One of those areas where the Stormers fell short was the breakdowns where they allowed Exeter to get quick ball and find space in a normally solid defensive system.

Fourie would have played a key role in stopping that, but he was ruled out of the match with a medial orbital wall (eye socket) fracture.

The 36-year-old is set to be on the sidelines for around a month as the Capetonians now turn their attention to the United Rugby Championship.

“I think it is going to be quite a while,” said Dobson on Fourie’s injury. “He blew his nose last Saturday [after the Harlequins clash] and his eye didn’t pop out, but it was one of those horrible ones.

“With those orbital fractures, you can get him back in three weeks, but or it could be six to eight weeks.

“He is tough, so maybe we are looking at four weeks.”

Dobson said it could have been a different story against Exeter if he had a proper “stealer” in his side.

“I don’t want to give excuses, but that first 20 minutes we were making too many single tackles,” Dobson explained.

“We weren’t going in for any steals and the ball they were getting was too fast and that sort of spirals and that is where we missed Deon.

“There were a couple of steal opportunities and he would have called in an extra cleaner and slowed the ball down.

“We missed him a helluva lot.

“I dint expect it to be quite like it was. Credit to Exeter on how they played, but we certainly missed him or Nama [Xaba] who are out-and-out stealers.”

The good news for the Stormers is that they will be getting Evan Roos back on the field soon.

The Springbok No.8 has been out since January when he suffered a knee injury in a URC clash against Ulster.

“Next week he can come off the bench [against Munster] or play in the Currie Cup,” said Dobson.

“I changed those two loose forwards at half-time [against Exeter], which is something I don’t like doing.

“It’s going to sound like an excuse, but in these conditions, if you put a Deon Fourie to slow down ball and an Evan Roos to give us some physicality around the gain line, we could have looked slightly different.

“He [Roos] will be back next week and that is really important for us at the sharp end of the [URC] competition.

“I think two of our biggest game-breakers last season were [Leolin] Zas and Evan and having them back in the next few weeks will be really good for us.”