Dai Young believes DHL Stormers demonstrated the level Cardiff Rugby must reach if they are to compete in the United Rugby Championships.
The Blue and Blacks were blown away in Cape Town as the home side ran in six unanswered tries, including three in a devastating seven minute purple patch.
It was a dominant performance from the South Africans, who boasted a full squad and showed no mercy in the blistering conditions. With their deadly combination of pace and power, they attacked from all angles and were well deserving of their victory.
And Young conceded they were by far the better side and demonstrated what his side must build towards.
He said: “Obviously the weather was a factor which we’re not used to but the Stormers team were more of a factor.
“Sometimes you have to put your hand up, take on the chin and be honest, and I thought they were a different level to us today. Their physicality, their power and pace, was too much for us and we haven’t come across too many teams who have played like that and we struggled to cope.
“We were tired because we didn’t any possession or territory. It was something like 35% possession and even that was in our own half so there was little we could do.
“We didn’t hold onto the ball for long periods, we went to five phases once and got to three phases twice so you are never going to ask a team of the Stormers defence any questions. We were giving away penalties so we were constantly defending and defending so that drained the life out of us.
“There are things we need to look at doing better, some of our exits weren’t where we would want them to be but if you kick loosely they have so much pace in the back three. The little chips over the top also killed us for the first three.
“Those kicks behind with so much pace after the ball and once that team gets two or three scores in front you are chasing the game.
“But the positives are we are all about learning, we want to get better and are nowhere near the finished article and it’s a new experience for us to play a team of that ability.
“Of course we are disappointed we lost but sometimes you just have to put your hand up, take it on the chin and it’s not easy to accept but the Stormers were a different level and we couldn’t cope with their physicality, their pace, their contact area was fantastic and we could get any of our game going.”
Cardiff depart South Africa this evening, empty-handed from their two rearranged fixtures, and now face a six-day turnaround to their next encounter against Glasgow Warriors.
They take on the Warriors at the Arms Park on Saturday as the season intensifies and Young knows his side have little time to feel sorry for themselves.
He added: “We should have got something out of the Lions game. We gave them too much of a head start, we had all the momentum but that yellow card in the process of scoring… if that had been a little bit different we would have come away with at least a losing bonus-point, if not more.
“You don’t get many opportunities in South Africa and if you get one, you have to take it. We let that slip but today we just weren’t at the same level as the Stormers.
“What we are taking is knowing we have a lot of work to do is we want to compete with the likes of the Stormers.
“We’re hugely disappointed with the result but we have to be honest with ourselves, dust ourselves off and work harder. If we want to compete we have to be so much better.
“We were beaten by a better team who have been operating at this level longer than we have and hopefully we will take a lot of learnings. We will look at ourselves hard, look at the things we can control and could have done better.
“We are on our own patch and we certainly want to bounce back. We’ll be honest with ourselves but we won’t beat ourselves up, what we concentrate on is Glasgow, which is now the most important game.”
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