Cape Town - You would think that a champion team like the Stormers would have a permanent home in the shape of the Cape Town Stadium, but it’s not to be in the new United Rugby Championship season.
Captain Steven Kitshoff and his team captured the imagination of the rugby-mad Cape public in June when they broke their silverware duck by winning the URC title, after years of heartbreak in Super Rugby.
The Stormers held off a strong challenge from the Bulls to clinch the final 18-13 to become the inaugural URC champions.
But on Wednesday, they announced that they won’t be able to play all their 2022/23 URC matches at the 2010 Fifa World Cup venue.
Instead, three of the games will have to be played at the Danie Craven Stadium in Stellenbosch, while one other will be hosted outside the Western Cape, at the Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium in Gqeberha.
“While every effort was made to avoid these clashes, the events at Cape Town Stadium had been booked up to a year in advance, while the United Rugby Championship fixtures could only be confirmed recently,” the Stormers said in a statement on Wednesday.
These changes to the fixture list were due to a number of entertainment and other sporting events, starting with Canadian superstar singer Justin Bieber’s concert being scheduled for the Cape Town Stadium on September 28.
That means that the Stormers’ first two home URC games, against Irish province Connacht and Scottish outfit Edinburgh on September 24 and October 1, will be played in Stellenbosch as the Bieber concert will “require significant construction in the stadium”.
The Cape Town Sevens tournament in December will also result in the Stormers playing elsewhere. The Blitzboks will be hoping to claim the title, but it means that John Dobson’s team have to host Welsh club Dragons in Gqerberha on December 3, with the sevens tournament from December 9-11.
In the fourth affected match, the Stormers take on Italian side Benetton on April 21 next year in Stellenbosch, as the Monster Jam truck show will be held at the Cape Town Stadium on April 22.
The Stormers’ first URC match at Cape Town Stadium will be on November 25, when they face the Scarlets of Wales.
In addition, the two European Champions Cup encounters against London Irish (weekend of December 16/17/18) and Clermont Auvergne (weekend of January 20/21/22) and all the Western Province Currie Cup games will be held at Cape Town Stadium this season.
The next major rugby event at the famous stadium will be the Rugby World Cup Sevens, which takes place on September 9-11.