Sean Farrell reports from Kingspan Stadium
WHILE THE MAKEUP of the teams will rightly temper celebrations, yesterday’s win over Leinster was an important step for Ulster.
Next weekend, with Glasgow awaiting in the semis, they face a crucial inter-provincial clash at home to Connacht. And even if you were to overlook the Westerners’ first win in Belfast since Michael D Higgins was an ebullient teen, derby days have been a cause of much consternation for the northern province this season.
While Dan McFarland’s first campaign as a head coach is defined by marked improvements in structure and performance, the most domestic of results have yielded just two wins from six against Irish sides – both coming in hard-fought fashion at home to a rival packing far from their full array of weaponry.
On the road they have lost to Connacht and suffered a heavy beating from Leinster at the RDS. But the worst result and performance came first, the record 64-7 thumping sustained in Thomond Park.
“We had a team meeting after and we said, ‘that’s the end of that and that’s the turning point.’ It did hurt a lot,” said Mike Lowry, whose reputation has leapt forward in giant strides in tandem with his province since he made his debut that dark night in Limerick.
Yet while the pain of defeat may have helped drive standards through the season as a whole, the turning point in inter-pros was not quite as easy to pinpoint as that.
After helping Ulster beat Leinster for the first time since Ruan Pienaar’s rowdy farewell, Alan O’Connor offered a sensible explanation for Ulster’s patchy derby form. Resources.
“A lot of young guys get chances around those periods because there are Champions Cup games coming up afterwards, it’s about growing the squad. Some of the same lads got a chance today and look what happened.
Everyone’s learning, we’ve a young team and building well since then.
“Against Connacht (at home), we had 14 men for a half and 13 men for 10 minutes. I don’t think we’ve anything to fear coming up.
“Obviously, inter-pros are really important, but we worry about the performance more and we performed well today and the result looked after itself.”
O’Connor remembers the run of play from the home loss to Connacht well, not just because he had his sleeves rolled up in the engine room with Iain Henderson, but because McFarland’s men have succeeded in making Kingspan Stadium a fortress in this campaign. So defeats sting.
Connacht’s first win in Belfast for 58 years was their sole loss on home turf. And while Benetton took a draw, Leinster yesterday were added to Racing 92, Leicester Tigers, Scarlets and Edinburgh as sides who were unable to get one over Ulster in Ravenhill.
While McFarland has his fair share of injury concerns, the Ulster who slumped to thrashings in Thomond and the RDS will not be the side facing up to Connacht next Saturday. They have grown throughout the season and the close-run-thing against Leinster in the Champions Cup quarter-final has given them a taste for knockout rugby.
“No one thought we’d win five out of six in the group in Europe,” said Jordi Murphy this week.
Then to come down to Leinster and put in a really big fight at the Aviva, and just come up short at the end, it was just a mixed feeling afterwards; it was incredibly disappointing to come out at the wrong end, but very pleasing to have seen the group stand up.
“Especially a young group where a lot of young guys wouldn’t have played in that type of game before with that kind of crowd, that kind of environment, against the European champions.
“To a man, all the boys stood up and on a different day maybe we would have got a result.
“It was one of those things that, I think, will really stand to the group going forward.”
Having held back Murphy and the rest of the big guns yesterday, Ulster are primed to show just how far they have come.
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