Ulster stay in the URC hunt after Parc Y Scarlets raid

Ulster ran in four second-half tries to give their BKT United Rugby Championship play-off hopes a major boost with a 31-20 bonus-point victory at Scarlets.

Ulster trailed 6-3 at half time at Parc Y Scarlets but their improved display after the interval saw them cement their place in the top eight.

Scarlets were on top for much of the first period but two yellow cards to key players in the final five minutes of the opening period ultimately caused their downfall.

Stormers head coach John Dobson on the race for a top-four spot in the URC standings

Video Player is loading.

Play Video

PauseSkip BackwardSkip Forward

Unmute

Current Time 0:00

/

Duration 0:58

Loaded: 0%

0:00

Stream Type LIVE

Seek to live, currently behind liveLIVE

Remaining Time -0:58

 

1x

Playback Rate

Chapters

• Chapters

Descriptions

• descriptions off, selected

Captions

• captions settings, opens captions settings dialog
• captions off, selected

Audio Track

• en (Main), selected

Fullscreen

This is a modal window.

Beginning of dialog window. Escape will cancel and close the window.

Text

ColorWhiteBlackRedGreenBlueYellowMagentaCyanOpacityOpaqueSemi-Transparent

Text Background

ColorBlackWhiteRedGreenBlueYellowMagentaCyanOpacityOpaqueSemi-TransparentTransparent

Caption Area Background

ColorBlackWhiteRedGreenBlueYellowMagentaCyanOpacityTransparentSemi-TransparentOpaque

Font Size

50%75%100%125%150%175%200%300%400%

Text Edge Style

NoneRaisedDepressedUniformDrop shadow

Font Family

Proportional Sans-SerifMonospace Sans-SerifProportional SerifMonospace SerifCasualScriptSmall Caps

ResetDone

Close Modal Dialog

End of dialog window.

Close Modal Dialog

This is a modal window. This modal can be closed by pressing the Escape key or activating the close button.

Stormers head coach John Dobson on the race for a top-four spot in the URC standings

With just two games left in the round-robin phase of the United Rugby Championship, Stormers head coach Dobson said his team will be going all out to try and secure a home quarterfinal.

Taine Plumtree was the first to go for tapping the ball out of the hands of John Cooney at a maul and then Gareth Davies departed for an alleged trip. Ulster scored two tries while they were off the field to take firm control of proceedings.

Having been forced to defend for much of the opening quarter the visitors found themselves trailing to two Sam Costelow penalties before John Cooney got one back in the 27th minute.

That gave them some confidence and three times Italian referee Gianluca Gnecchi decided Ulster forwards had been held up over the line before he blew for half-time.

It was a different Ulster that came out for the second half and a 60-metre break up the right touchline forced the home side to defend a lineout five metres out and Stuart McCloskey capitalised three minutes after the re-start.

Fixture

United Rugby Championship

Scarlets

20 - 31

Full-time

Ulster

All Stats and Data

All they had to do was get the ball into the wide, unguarded open spaces against 13 men and McCloskey cut back against the grain to score at the posts.

Cooney added the extras and then improved a close range try by number eight Nick Timoney before Davies returned.

That created some breathing space on the scoreboard and David McCann’s effort in the 55th minute allowed Cooney to add two more points to make it 24-6. Now it was a race to the bonus-point, although before Ulster got there they conceded a try to home Nnumber eight Carwyn Tuipulotu which Costelow improved.

Jacob Stockdale grabbed the fourth try for the extra point with an overlap score on the left wing – his eighth try of the campaign. Cooney hit the target again to make it an 18-point lead.

Back came the Scarlets with a breakaway try for wing Tomi Lewis but that was as good as it got for the hosts.