{"id":345641,"date":"2025-12-13T15:55:10","date_gmt":"2025-12-13T15:55:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/345641\/"},"modified":"2025-12-13T15:55:10","modified_gmt":"2025-12-13T15:55:10","slug":"stormers-blow-past-ronan-ogara-less-la-rochelle-in-champions-cup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/345641\/","title":{"rendered":"Stormers blow past Ronan O’Gara-less La Rochelle in Champions Cup"},"content":{"rendered":"\n

Stormers<\/a> powered to an emphatic 42-21 victory over La Rochelle in the Investec Champions Cup<\/a> at Nelson Mandela Bay Stadium, running in six tries to overwhelm the French side with a dominant second-half display.<\/p>\n

The visitors were also operating without DoR Ronan O\u2019Gara on the sidelines. The Ireland<\/a> and Munster<\/a> legend was barred from pitchside duties after receiving a two-week suspension and a \u20ac3,000 fine following a red card in La Rochelle\u2019s recent Top 14<\/a> defeat to Pau.<\/p>\n

The South African hosts struck early when Dylan Maart<\/a> dotted down inside two minutes after Springbok superstar Sacha Feinberg-Mngomezulu<\/a> split the French defence before offloading to the winger. <\/p>\n

They doubled their advantage soon after through Leolin Zas<\/a>, again created by Feinberg-Mngomezulu, although missed conversions kept the score 10-0.<\/p>\n

La Rochelle responded through a driving maul finished by Quentin Lespiaucq. Diego Jurd\u2019s conversion then cut the gap to three points. <\/p>\n

Points Flow Chart <\/p>\n

Stormers win +21<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Time in lead<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

29%<\/p>\n

Possession Last 10 min<\/p>\n

71%<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

Feinberg-Mngomezulu steadied the Stormers ship with two penalties before the break, before Andre-Hugo Venter<\/a> crossed from close range shortly after the restart to give the hosts breathing space.<\/p>\n

Despite a yellow card for Neethling Fouche<\/a> and a brief La Rochelle fightback via Nika Sutidze<\/a>, the Stormers took control. Tries from Maart and Warrick Gelant<\/a>, both converted by Feinberg-Mngomezulu, stretched the lead beyond reach.<\/p>\n

Nathan Bollengier replied for the visitors late on, but it was too little too late.<\/p>\n

Indeed, the Stormers had the final word when Marcel Theunissen<\/a> finished a flowing move in the closing stages. <\/p>\n

Feinberg-Mngomezulu added the extras to cap a commanding performance.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Stormers powered to an emphatic 42-21 victory over La Rochelle in the Investec Champions Cup at Nelson Mandela…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":345642,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[64,63,760,85],"class_list":{"0":"post-345641","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-rugby","8":"tag-au","9":"tag-australia","10":"tag-rugby","11":"tag-sports"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/345641","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=345641"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/345641\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/345642"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=345641"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=345641"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=345641"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}