Moffie some help on CJ

Stander made a game- leading 23 carries yesterday – and all for 40 yards. It sounds like a small return for such effort but these were gains made amidst the madness of the ‘pick n’ go’ world of a blindside flanker. So, two metres per carry? An incredible effort.

Flanker was Ireland’s opening spell made flesh and deserved man of match award

The one thing you can say for Christiaan Johan Stander is that he makes a habit of making a first impression. On his debut start for Munster against Glasgow away back in 2012, he bullocked over for a couple of tries and took home the Man of the Match award. Here, he didn’t quite manage the five-pointer but he as good as had Man of the Match tucked away inside the opening half an hour.

He even made a point of shaking hands with each of the journalists who circled him for the post-match quotes, although we must presume he’ll grow out of that in time.

Stander was Ireland’s opening spell made flesh. He barrelled into Welshmen at every opportunity, thunked his way over the gainline right from the off.

In keeping with the rest of his team, that early intensity waned a little as the afternoon wore on. But he caught enough eyes to have his name called out as time ran dead near the end. You’d be hard pushed to be dogmatic that someone else deserved it more.

http://www.balls.ie/rugby/cj-stander-south-african-reaction/323833

It may not have been a winning debut for Stander, but it was certainly one he won't be forgetting any time soon. 

The somewhat anti-climatic feeling that generally follows a drawn game was drowned out by an air of excitement surrounding Ireland's latest international. 

With 23 carries, making 40 metres, 11 tackles and an unmatched work-rate across the 80 minutes, CJ Stander has certainly left his mark on test level rugby.

At provincial level, Stander picked up Man of the Match accolades for fun with performances like these, and again his brilliance was recognised today, scooping up the award on his first cap. 

Perhaps the biggest compliment that could be paid to Stander's performance was that he didn't look an inch out of place among Sam Warburton, Toby Faletau and Justin Tipuric, the much vaunted Welsh backrow. 

And what of CJ Stander? Despite Welsh derision at Jamie Roberts being overlooked for man of the match, I felt the official nod in Stander's direction to be spot on.

He was brilliant in almost everything he did with the more dynamic ball-carrying moments underscored by that trademark work ethic of his.

Had Sean O'Brien been available, it is most likely Stander's first cap would have come on the hour, instead, and with the Tank likely to be back for Paris, Stander's name is assured in the back-row.

A cartographer mapping CJ Stander’s rise could hardly be faulted for simply retracing the trajectory of a sky rocket, engines ablaze, shooting skyward from the Cape Canaveral launch pad.

With a single precipitous upward flourish of pen upon paper, the atlas of Stander’s jaw-dropping international take-off would be complete.

A stratospheric ascent has ushered the Munster captain to new terrain at the northern pole of the old game’s hierarchy.

And in so doing he helped to airlift his adopted nation from the pit of World Cup despair.

Danish beer companies don’t do international debuts, but if they did…

A stunning opening salvo from Stander felt like an eviction notice to the virus of negativity that has been squatting in Irish rugby’s soul since the autumn.

Stripped of those twin behemoths of charisma and achievement, Paul O’Connell and Brian O’Driscoll, jolted by the provinces' tame European meltdown, Schmidt ached for a mainspring to redirect Ireland back to the very best of themselves.

They found him in a South African who arrived in Limerick three years ago with little other than a rejection letter from his home land. It read, bluntly, brutally: Too small, won't make it. 

Here he was a ball-carrying totem, a defensive Hercules, a mammoth wall of green defiance.

Stander was a tide of yearning that simply refused to ebb.  His craving was infectious.

Gosh Dave - be a little bit more specific with your headings. " Moffie some help on CJ"

and I almost gave the thread a pass because I was always under the impression that CJ  refers to CJ van der Linde.