New Zealand opened their tour of South Africa with an error-strewn victory over the Stormers, beating the provincial side ⁠38-21 in an unconvincing start to their eight-match programme.

Four tries in the closing stages at the Cape Town Stadium allowed the All Blacks to pull away as the Stormers, without several of their internationals, provided surprisingly tough opposition and were level at 14-14 in the 65th minute.

Samisoni Taukei’aho, Simon Parker, Rieko Ioane, Leroy Carter, Josh Moorby ⁠and Asafo Aumua were the tourists’ try scorers with ​Beauden ⁠Barrett kicking over three conversions and Josh Jacomb one.

The Stormerspoints came from loose forward Deon Fourie, who turns 40 next month, and winger Seabelo Senatla, plus a conversion from 20-year-old debutant fly-half Yaqeen Ahmed. They were also awarded a penalty try two minutes from the end ​when Warrick ⁠Gelant was tackled high by Moorby as ‌he was going for the line.

The All Blacks threatened to run riot in an exciting start as they attacked the Stormersdefence at pace, and home resistance lasted all of six minutes before hooker Taukei’aho went over from a line-out maul. But indiscipline quickly cost ‌them the opportunity to add more points, and by the 15th minute, they were down to 13 men with both Anton Lienert-Brown and Parker sent to the sin bin.

The Stormers made use of the numerical advantage, and after an initial maul over the line was disallowed, they tied the score as Fourie went over from a line-out maul to level the scores. Handling errors then proved costly for the tourists, who also gave away seven first-half penalties, before a line break down the middle by Ioane led to a try in the corner for Parker one minute before halftime and a narrow 14-7 advantage at the break.

Matters were level in the 57th minute as winger Senatla sprinted through the Kiwi defences.

Ioane finished off a drive down the middle of the pitch with a pick-up close to the line to put the Kiwis back in front, and they then took advantage of a tiring home side. In the last 10 ⁠minutes, Carter jinked his way over in the right-hand corner, and a charge down from ⁠Moorby made sure there would be no upset home success.

Taukei’aho burst over from a maul for his second try with the last move of the game. The tour ​is the first of its kind for 30 years ‌and sees the All Blacks play four Tests ​and four matches against provincial opposition. Their next outing is in Durban on Tuesday against the Sharks.

Reuters

Former AEW champion Ricochet has an explicit message for a popular CMLL talent whom he and his teammates attacked this week. The latter, Kemalito, was seen hanging with The Death Riders backstage in a photograph that went viral after the show.

Days after Redemption 2026, on the July 29 edition of Wednesday Night Dynamite, Ricochet and The Gates of Agony challenged Orange Cassidy, Roderick Strong and Kyle O’Reilly for their AEW World Trios Championships. The Demand were able to defeat the Conglomeration members and claim their belts thanks to outside interference from their allies, The Lethal Twist. Post-match, the heel alliance put the boots on the fan-favorites, even taking out Brody King when he arrived to help because of their numbers advantage.

Thankfully, Adam Page then showed up with a barbed wire steel chair to fight off The Demand, The Swirl and Jay Lethal. Afterwards, The Cowboy proposed to “Big Bad” Brody and his partner Bandido that they should join forces to challenge The Demand for their trios belts at AEW Grand Slam Mexico. Hangman and Brodido entered Arena Mexico this Wednesday alongside CMLL crowd-favorite Kemalito. While the latter was at ringside to cheer on the babyface team, he unfortunately got attacked by Ricochet and GOA in the middle of their World Trios Title bout.

Regardless, The Demand ended up losing their belts to Page, King and Bandido this Wednesday. Not long after the show, a photograph of Kemalito hanging out with The Death Riders backstage began circulating on social media. Fans also shared pics of him alongside Brodido and Hangman and Willow Nightingale. Kemalito’s apparent rapport with so many AEW names was supposedly the reason why The Demand jumped him at Grand Slam Mexico, Ricochet explained on X/Twitter recently, writing:

“This why we jumped this little *****. Flip flopping ass h*e.” – posted Ricochet.

It remains to be seen how The Demand will bounce back from their trios title loss this week.

The Death Riders were in action at AEW Grand Slam Mexico

The Death Riders kicked off the action for the main card of AEW Grand Slam Mexico this Wednesday. The leader of the group, Jon Moxley, teamed with PAC, Wheeler Yuta and Daniel Garcia to take on Adam Copeland, Christian Cage and The Young Bucks in an eight-person tag bout. The One True King was able to score the victory on behalf of his team by rolling up The Rated-R Superstar into a pinfall with a handful of tights, after Cope got distracted due to a collision with Matt Jackson while running the ropes.

Mox is now poised to defend his Continental Championship in a brand new tournament, the Continental Cup, that is set to begin soon, and will culminate at All In: London.