Bulls flyhalf Morne Steyn kicked the winning conversion two minutes from time to complete a stunning 25-23 win over the Cheetahs on Friday in an all-South African Super rugby match.
The defending champions looked down and out when they trailed 23-8 going into the final quarter, but two late tries by two of their most experienced players, Danie Rossouw and Fourie du Preez, turned the tide against their inexperienced opponents.
The latter’s score tied the match in the 78th minute, leaving Steyn the chance to administer the last rites with his trusted right boot and the metronomic Springbok flyhalf made no mistake.
“We should have finished them off,” Cheetahs captain Naas Olivier said. “We put in a great performance, but didn’t win the game.”
The Cheetahs, who lost their opening match against the Sharks last week, were dealt a blow when their inspirational captain Juan Smith left the field in the second minute with a knee injury.
Home flyhalf Olivier, nevertheless, put his side 3-0 ahead with a penalty, before the Bulls, who beat the Lions the previous week, scored the opening try through lock Bakkies Botha in the 17th minute.
Winger Gerhard van den Heever made a telling break and 72-Test veteran Botha was on hand to dive over in the right-hand corner after sustained pressure.
Steyn made it 8-5 with a penalty, but the Cheetahs responded from the kickoff when center Andries Strauss ran 25m to dive over and level the scores.
Strauss, who won his Springbok colors against the Barbarians in December, ran a perfect line off another replacement, loose forward Ashley Johnson, to split open the visiting defense.
Olivier and Steyn missed five kicks between them in the opening stanza, but Olivier still put his team ahead two minutes before the break when he potted a second penalty.
The Cheetahs increased their lead to 10 within two minutes of the restart when center Robert Ebersohn crashed over after another telling break from Johnson and Olivier converted.
Johnson, who had replaced Smith’s flanker partner Frans Viljoen after 23 minutes, capped off an industrious cameo performance when he crashed over from close range in the 48th minute to increase the lead to 15 points.
The Bulls, forced to play catch-up rugby, upped the pace in the final quarter and were rewarded when replacement flanker Rossouw dotted down after a backpedaling Cheetahs scrum produced a loose ball near their own line. Steyn converted to reduce the deficit to eight.
The flyhalf then upped the tension when his second penalty made it a five-point game, before scrumhalf partner Du Preez leveled the scores with a try three minutes from time.
Steyn nailed the conversion to give his team the narrowest of victories.
“It was an ugly win, but we’ll take that over nice losses,” winning captain Victor Matfield said.
A sumo star was born in Japan on Sunday when 24-year-old Takerufuji became the first wrestler in 110 years to win a top-division tournament on his debut, triumphing at the 15-day Spring Grand Sumo Tournament in Osaka despite injuring his ankle on the penultimate day. Takerufuji, whose injury had left him in a wheelchair outside the ring, shoved out the higher-ranked Gonoyama at the Edion Arena Osaka to the delight of the crowd, giving him an unassailable record of 13 wins and two losses to claim the Emperor’s Cup. “I did it just through willpower. I didn’t really know what was going
The US’ Ilia Malinin on Saturday produced six scintillating quadruple jumps, including a quadruple Axel, in the men’s free skate to capture his first figure skating world title. The 19-year-old nicknamed the “Quad god,” who is the only skater to land a quadruple Axel in competition, dazzled with an array of breathtakingly executed jumps starting with his quad Axel and including a quadruple Lutz in combination with a triple flip and a quadruple toe loop in combination with a triple toe. He added an unexpected triple-triple combination at the end to earn a world-record 227.79 in the free program for a championship
Shohei Ohtani’s interpreter is being criminally investigated by the IRS, and the attorney for his alleged bookmaker said Thursday that the ex-Los Angeles Dodgers employee placed bets on international soccer — but not baseball. The IRS confirmed Thursday that interpreter Ippei Mizuhara and Mathew Bowyer, the alleged illegal bookmaker, are under criminal investigation through the agency’s Los Angeles Field Office. IRS Criminal Investigation spokesperson Scott Villiard said he could not provide additional details. Mizuhara, 39, was fired by the Dodgers on Wednesday following reports from the Los Angeles Times and ESPN about his alleged ties to an illegal bookmaker and debts well
MLB on Friday announced a formal investigation into the scandal swirling around Shohei Ohtani and his former interpreter amid charges that the Los Angeles Dodgers superstar was the victim of “massive theft.” The Dodgers on Wednesday fired Ippei Mizuhara, Ohtani’s long-time interpreter and close friend, after Ohtani’s representatives alleged that the Japanese two-way star had been the victim of theft, which was reported to involve millions of dollars and link Mizuhara to a suspected illegal bookmaker in California. “Major League Baseball has been gathering information since we learned about the allegations involving Shohei Ohtani and Ippei Mizuhara from the news media,” MLB