Springboks wing Kurt-Lee Arendse produced a dominant display to help his Japanese club beat a Kobelco Kobe Steelers side captained by ex-All Blacks lock Brodie Retallick.
The speedster crossed for two tries in the 34-26 victory as the Mitsubishi Heavy Industries Sagamihara Dynaboars claimed a shock win over the Steelers in round four of the Japan Rugby League One season.
It was a profitable weekend for the Springboks this past weekend in Japan with Jesse Kriel (2), Kwagga Smith, Cheslin Kolbe and Damian de Allende all grabbing tries for their respective teams.
Arendse’s brace though means that he has now scored four tries in as many appearances in the competition – he also boasts two assists for a total of six try involvements in his four caps.
Arendse stars for Dynaboars
Arendse emphatically got the scoring underway on Sunday as he latched onto a pass from Curtis Rona on his 22-metre line after the former Wallaby had scooped up the ball after a poor pass by Kobe who were on the attack.
He made it look all too easy from there as he simply sped away from the Kobe defenders who didn’t lay a figure on him as he raced to the try line in the fourth minute.
He doubled his tally in the eighth minute when he received the ball out wide and swatted off the cover tackle by Japan international Ryohei Yamanaka to canter in for his fourth try of the season.
With their tails now up, the Dynaboars extended their lead through ex-Bulls lock Walt Steenkamp who powered over the line from short-range after Kobe stopped a driving maul.
The far more fancied Steelers eventually got on the scoreboard after a pinpoint cross-kick from Seungsin Lee landed perfectly for Kanta Matsunaga, who threw a blind offload onto the deck which Tienan Costley was on hand to scoop up and score.
Lee looked to have scored Kobe’s second when he pounced on a loose ball and weaved through the traffic from 40 metres out but the try was called back as the ball had gone forward off teammate Tim Lafaelele before the fly-half’s involvement.
Retallick’s charges fall short
The Dynaboars survived a late first-half onslaught before Kazuki Ishida nailed a long-range penalty to give his side a 24-7 buffer at half-time.
Arendse was then at the centre of their first try of the second half as the winger forced a turnover from Retallick before his hooker Seunghyuk Lee kicked upfield for his winger to chase.
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The Springbok timed his chase perfectly as Lee failed to regather the ball, providing Arendse with a 2v1 opportunity against Yamanaka and he executed it perfectly to send Jack Stratton over.
With a 34-7 deficit, Kobe were staring down a massive defeat and launched a late rally to get something from the match.
Retallick led the charge with a try from short-range with further scores from Costley and Willie Potgieter. Kobe pushed for another late score to earn a losing bonus-point but ultimately they fell short as the Dynaboars held out for the win, handing Kobe their third defeat of the new season.
Arendse finished the match with the most running metres in the fixture racking up 138 in total while he also beat five defenders, make three clean breaks and won two turnovers.
Src: Planetrugby.com - https://www.planetrugby.com/news/springboks-star-kurt-lee-arendse-dominates-with-80-metre-try-in-shock-win-over-brodie-retallicks-steelers
