The Stormers are going back to the drawing board after another painful end to their Super Rugby campaign.
It was one of those performances that just disappointed almal - the fans, the coach and players.
And, boy, did the players take the defeat hard.
Hulle was darem treurig on the pitch. And the arme manne did their best to drown their sorrows. Sommer sucking on the bottle for a day straight.
Poor guys. But the answers to the Stormers problems are not at the bottom of the bottle.
And coach Robbie Fleck knows this.
He has a more holistic solution: travelling the world.
When I heard Fleckie say that, my mind started throwing up pictures.
In my head, I could see the boss backpacking through the Amazon, meeting never- contacted-before tribes in the jungle.
Or climbing Kilimanjaro and trekking the Masai Mara before jumping with that famous tribe.
Or finding a sherpa to guide him to a Buddhist monastery in Nepal somewhere.
Ja. It’s that sort of soul-searching that these manne need.
This past season, they tried to switch things up.
Approach
The approach changed. They tried to play more rugby. And they tried to take on the New Zealanders at their own game.
That plan bombed big time Down Under. They lost all their games on tour, shipping 155 points in three matches.
The upshot was that the confidence they built up in an opening run of six wins and a victory over the Chiefs was shattered by the time they hosted the Waikato side last Saturday.
They didn’t even try to play the attacking brand they had been pushing.
For Fleck and his team, the pain was just too much - having suffered the same fate from the year before, losing to the Chiefs at Newlands in the quarterfinals.
At the end of the day, it’s easy to say that the Streeptruie have learnt nothing.
The reality is that they have made progress. They must stick to the plan.
If this soul-searching is to have a positive effect, then they have to keep pushing through.
The Lions are the shining example of South African rugby at the moment and getting to another Super Rugby final this weekend, hopefully, has to be a sign to the Stormers that they are on the right path.
They have to realise that what they do has to be the game that brings the best out of the players on attack and that they work as a team on defence.
Just like the Lions, this won’t happen over night.
But if Fleckie is to find anything of worth on his travels, it’s got to be patience and self-belief.
Then maybe the Stormers can have a celebration drink.