THEY MAY HAVE completed a clean sweep of Pool Five in the Heineken Cup with a 22-19 win away to the the reigning Aviva Premiership champions, but that doesn’t mean Ulster have even begun to think of a repeat of their success in this competition 15 years ago.
Indeed, speaking after the game, Ulster coach Mark Anscombe was more concerned with enjoying victory over the Leicester Tigers than he was any talk of the future.
“Let’s enjoy our success. It’s the first time I think Ulster’s done six out of six. You’ve got to enjoy that, so the boys should have a few beers tonight and then they’ll reflect on what they’ve done. We’ve got a break now for the international window.”
“We’ve got to keep our feet firmly on the ground. We haven’t won anything yet.”
The Kiwi was particularly proud of the way his side stepped up to the plate at the end of the match, coming from seven points down as the game entered the final 30 minutes.
“The way we came back… If you look at the last three scrums of the game, we totally dominated.
“They had a scrum five yards from the goal line, and you think, ‘this is going to be trouble’. And they had a lineout five yards from the goal line, which hasn’t been a strength of ours of late, and we stopped them both dead perfectly.
“It shows the guys have been working on things and what they’re capable of when they focus on the job in hand.”
“We showed a lot of characteristics to hang in there when we weren’t playing perfectly, but we showed a lot of resistance and resilience to hang in there and keep that discipline.”
While plenty of praise was heaped on Ruan Pienaar after the South African scored all 22 of Ulster’s points, Anscombe believes the foundation laid by his team-mates gives the scrum-half the platform to excel.
“It’s easy to say that we’re one person, but we’re a team. [Ruan]’s a quality player, as they have quality players. Quality players are the icing on the cake, but you’ve got to have the others doing their jobs. It’s not about one person, it’s a team effort.”
With Ulster now guaranteed to be the top ranked team, a rematch with Saracens — their conquerors at the same stage last year — is something Anscombe and his management team will worry about after the next round of Rabo Pro12 fixtures.
“It’s two months away. There was only one team in the quarter final last year and it certainly wasn’t us. But this time we’ve got them at home.
“We’ve got to go back to the Rabo now and ensure we stay in the competition there and keep ourselves in a good position.”
Additional reporting by Martin Crowson.
