ULSTER WERE THE busiest offloaders on the opening weekend of the Guinness Pro14 season, as Dan McFarland’s team topped the charts with 18 successful offloads.
Any side with Stuart McCloskey in midfield is going to feature a fair degree of passing out of contact and his four offloads had him joint-top of the individual Pro14 offloading list alongside team-mate Marcell Coetzee.
New fullback Will Addison was close behind them with three, but it was the contribution of Coetzee and his fellow forwards to a skillful Ulster approach that was among the most interesting factors in their dramatic win over the Scarlets.
There were some misjudged and poorly-executed offloads and passes in Ulster’s game, with some of the more forced efforts threatening to put the northern province under pressure against a team who thrive on turnovers.
But the clear policy of backing forwards to show their skills is exciting for Ulster’s squad and their supporters as they look to move forward under McFarland.
One passage in the first-half stands out, beginning with a turnover at scrum time.
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The influential John Cooney pounces on Sam Hidalgo-Clyne just as he looks to clear the ball from the base of the scrum.
Coetzee scoops up the loose possession and fires out a powerful left-handed fend at the Scarlets scrum-half, freeing his right hand to offload to Craig Gilroy, allowing the wing to burst forward into space.
Cooney is quick to the breakdown for a rapid recycle after Gilroy’s strong carry and we see more skill from a pair of Ulster forwards.
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19-year-old tighthead prop Tom O’Toole thunders onto the front-foot ball and draws in the fast-advancing and offside Rob Evans, before slipping an inside pass to Iain Henderson.
It’s a lovely show of handling ability from O’Toole, who had a brilliant opening 19 minutes against the Scarlets before being forced off with a head injury. He won a scrum penalty, made a huge carry and hammered into five tackles in that time, while this pass showed he is about more than brute force.
With Scarlets locks David Bulbring and Steve Cummins planted on their heels in front of him, Henderson – who was at the heart of Ulster’s win on Saturday – needs no second invitation to carry on the Ulster momentum and he ploughs into Bulbring.
With Henderson so far over the gainline, we see a positive support line from Cooney on his inside, actively looking for the offload that he knows Henderson is capable of releasing.
Cooney is tackled from behind by Hidalgo-Clyne but another quick recycle sees Sean Reidy playing scrum-half, with Ulster making a midfield carry through captain Alan O’Connor on the next phase.
The backs take over from there and, with the Scarlets defence narrowed, we see another offload – this time from McCloskey.
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The Scarlets would have been disappointed to allow one pass from Cooney to take out four of their defenders here, leaving James Davies with a tricky task out in the midfield.
The Scarlets openside is briefly drawn in towards Burns and McCloskey takes that as his cue to burst to Davies’ outside shoulder, forcing Kieran Fonotia to turn in too.
Neither Scarlets player can get a shoulder on the imposing figure of McCloskey, who frees his right hand to offload to the supporting Cave.
Cave reads McCloskey’s intent intelligently, straightening up to his outside shoulder, but as we can see above, Scarlets centre Steffan Hughes just impedes Cave on his way into the offloading channel.
It’s clever play if you can get away with it and Hughes is just subtle enough in his actions to do so, meaning that Cave stumbles as he gathers in the ball from McCloskey’s offload.
The stumble takes away a crucial split-second of decision-making time for Cave.
We can see above that there are options for him inside and out, but with his time on the ball at a premium as Clayton Blommetjies advances to tackle him, Cave can only really see the pass to his left.
The retreating Tom Prydie manages to stretch up a crucial left hand to bat Cave’s attempted pass wide to Henry Speight down before the Ulster outside centre shows good skill to reel the ball back in.
Ulster’s immediate chance is gone but they draw a high tackle penalty from the scrambling Scarlets defence and kick three points through Cooney.
McFarland’s men were left frustrated at not scoring a try last weekend, particularly as they created 11 linebreaks, and converting chances like the one above will be a key focus this week ahead of the visit of Edinburgh to Belfast on Friday.
But to see the skill of their forwards creating opportunities is exciting as they move forward.
It was fitting that the winning penalty of the game came after something similar from the Ulster pack.
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Replacement back row Chris Henry is in the middle of a three-man pod outside Burns, and shows his passing skill on this occasion.
With Ulster trailing 13-12 and running out of time, the Scarlets appear to be expecting a direct carry from Henry here, with Cummins and Phil Price closing in on him to make the tackle [red below].
To their inside, Evans [white] has ever-so-briefly switched off as he drifts out from closer to the ruck.
Evans does then recognise the danger of the inside pass as Henry begins to shape for it and he zeroes in on Ross Kane, but the Ulster replacement tighthead shows great skill to transfer the ball into his right hand and fire out his left to fend Evans.
It’s a really accurate fend from Kane, who powers his left hand into Evans’ right shoulder, which the Scarlets prop needs to drive into Kane to make an impact with his tackle.
With the accelerating Kane shoving that right shoulder down into the turf, Evans is left trying to cling on with his hands and Kane is able to slip free upfield.
Coming from the initial ruck, Cooney runs another optimistic support line to Kane’s inside shoulder and the retreating David Bulbring can’t resist from reaching out and grabbing the Ulster scrum-half’s jersey.
It’s a clear penalty to Ulster and Cooney holds his nerve to kick the winning penalty – only minutes after missing an effort from out to the right of the posts.
While Henry’s inside pass to Kane is very simple, it’s encouraging to see new head coach McFarland backing his players to deliver on these basic skills.
There is certainly some refining to do around when and where passes and offloads are thrown – as well as the accuracy of some of them – but Ulster’s forwards appeared energised by the approach.
As crucially as the skill level on the ball, the Ulster pack fronted up muscularly in the tight in several key moments of their win over the Scarlets.
Last season, Ulster were widely perceived as being soft up front, giving up mauling yards too easily and failing to pressure opposition packs.
It will, of course, take some time to completely change that perception but the win over the Scarlets was a fine start as McFarland’s pack delivered some vital turnovers at the lineout and maul.
Henderson had one superb lineout steal just outside Ulster’s 22 in the second half, while he forced the Scarlets to spill another of their throws back into touch in an almost identical position only minutes later.
The outstanding Henderson also won a maul turnover in the 35th minute inside the Ulster 22, while the rabid defensive counter metres from their own tryline we see below, in the 60th minute, would have been a major confidence booster for this Ulster pack.
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Frustratingly, Ulster gave up a penalty under the posts just a couple of phases after this, but the initial maul defence would have been pleasing.
Referee Marius Mitrea is happy with O’Connor sacking Scarlets lineout receiver Cummins in this instance, while Kane, Nick Timoney and Reidy thunder in on the counter-drive and Henderson targets the ball as it’s being transferred by the Scarlets.
The challenge now for Ulster is to build on this encouraging performance, finding the kind of consistency that can allow them to thrive even when the talismanic Henderson is on international duty.
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