The Brumbies will walk about into a behind-the-scenes storm when they return to Canberra this week. The club is still finding its feet after the board decided to stand down chief executive Michael Jones last week. Jones took the board to court and won an injunction against the decision, allowing him to return to work. The Brumbies players gathered at their Cape Town base to discuss the news when it broke. But from that moment they pushed it into the background and focused on beating the Cheetahs. That's easy enough to do in a different time zone and when you're almost 11,000 kilometres away. But Jones and the board will go back to court on Tuesday, just hours after the Brumbies squad arrives back in Canberra. The club needs to unite and the players will try to deflect any off-field drama to concentrate on the challenge of the Chiefs.

Referees must be starting to worry that they'll need to carry a spare whistle for Brumbies games just incase they blow the pea out of the first one. The Brumbies conceded 16 penalties in a stop-start affair against the Cheetahs. The high tally was contributed to by sloppy conditions and a tough scrum battle. But Scott Fardy was regularly pinned with some tight calls. Lock Sam Carter was sent to the sin bin as a result of repeated team infringements just before half-time. In five games, the Brumbies have now received four yellow cards and one red card. It's an unwanted record, but they must fix their discipline before it comes back to bite them. They gave away 11 penalties last week against the Cape Town Stormers as well. In fairness, the Cheetahs were also penalised 13 times in a match that didn't have any real flow after half-time.

The Brumbies got off to a flying start when they appeared to go almost the length of the field in the first 30 seconds to score a try. The play was called back by the television match official despite the try being awarded on the field, and the ruling was that Scott Fardy threw a forward pass to winger Joseph Tomane. Tomane booted the ball down field, the Cheetahs made a mess of it and Tomas Cubelli pounced to score. But the forward-pass ruling was correct and the Brumbies scored three minutes later. Tomane leads the Australian teams for linebreaks this year. However, the ball rarely made it out to him after his opening-minute bust. He had just one run for the game and was replaced late in the second half. The Brumbies need to find a way to give him room to move, because the NRL convert has proved a handful for teams this year and looks dangerous every time he touches the ball.

The Brumbies set piece has been extremely strong in the opening rounds of the competition, but it stumbled in heavy conditions against the Cheetahs. The Cheetahs went into the game with the worst scrum success rate in the competition, dropping to around 70 per cent. But they overpowered the Brumbies at different times and managed to use it as a platform to attack when they didn't have the ball. Sam Carter's absence due to a yellow card as a major factor, but the Brumbies couldn't overpower their rivals. It's by no means time for alarm bells, but something to keep an eye on. Scrum coach Dan Palmer remained in Canberra while the team toured South Africa. Getting some first-hand guidance will go a long way to resurrecting any structural problems before playing the Chiefs.