All Blacks Ardie Savea and Anton Lienert-Brown fire Kobe to victory over Pieter-Steph and Toyota Verblitz
Kobe's Ardie Savea and an inset of Toyota Verblitz's Pieter-Steph du Toit.
The Kobelco Kobe Steelers notched up their second win of the Japan Rugby League One season beating Toyota Verblitz 49-29 on Saturday.
Ardie Savea scored a brace of tries in the win, with fellow All Blacks Brodie Retallick and Anton Lienert-Brown also crossing for five pointers.
Kobe dominate
All in all, Dave Rennie’s side grabbed seven tries against the club led by former New Zealand bosses Sir Steve Hansen and Ian Foster.
It was Hansen’s charges who started the game better, as Yoshikatsu Hisosaka benefitted from a strong driving maul but Kobe responded quickly first through Retallick and then Seugnsin Lee to lead 14-7.
Savea powered over from close range for the first of his two tries in the 26th minute but Verblitz stayed within touching distance as Keito Aoki dotted down.
Hosts Kobe had the final say of the half courtesy of former Blues second-rower Gerard Cowley-Tuioti, who scored to give his side a 28-17 halftime advantage.
Second half
Savea kick-started the next try-scoring opportunity with a fantastic run from inside his own half from the back of a scrum, and the move ended with Itsuki Kamimura scooping up the ball and diving over the line after a neat grubber through from full-back Kanta Masunaga.
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The All Blacks loose forward doubled his tally in the 66th minute after a strong maul was stopped a metre short, and he finished the job two phases later, which opened up a 25-point lead.
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Lienert-Brown followed four minutes later to extend the lead, and while Will Tupou and Shingya Komura grabbed late tries, the game was well beyond Verblitz’s reach.
The win for Kobe comes off the back of an opening day defeat to the Kubota Spears, which was followed by a narrow 28-23 win over Honda Heat.
Meanwhile, Aaron Smith and Pieter-Steph du Toit will be hoping that they can turn things around for Verblitz, who have now suffered back-to-back defeats after losing 43-25 to Suntory last time out after beating Honda Heat 44-33 in the opening round.
