John Dobson is expecting an entertaining affair when Harlequins visit Cape Town to take on the DHL Stormers in the Champions Cup Round of 16 on Saturday.
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The Vodacom United Rugby Championship (URC) title holders are debuting in EPCR competitions this season and they welcome a Quins side who were the joint-third highest try-scorers in the Champions Cup pool stage.
The Stormers drew 22-22 with Leinster in the Vodacom URC last Friday and Dobson says that game was the perfect preparation for their Round of 16 showdown in the South African sun.
“The first task was to get the guys battle-hardened and ready for Harlequins, which is a knockout game,” he said.
“It looks like we’re going to be ready [for Quins]. We’ve done quite a bit of work on them. It’s going to be a great spectacle in our conditions, with their style of rugby.”
Dobson went on to identify the threats posed by Quins’ England international half-back combination of Danny Care and Marcus Smith, while also picking out Springbok centre André Esterhuizen as a key man for the visitors.
“I mean, Danny Care and Marcus Smith, they’ve got real skill with those two half-backs,” he highlighted.
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“They play a great, attractive brand of rugby, so we are going to do what we did against Leinster – slow some ball down (at the breakdown), stop Andre Esterhuizen.
“It’s going to be a great spectacle with hopefully 50,000 people in the DHL Stadium.”
Knock, Knock ?#COYQ pic.twitter.com/xQ0swowfWi
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