Northern Edition

Select Edition

Northern Northern
Southern Southern
Global Global
New Zealand New Zealand
France France

Ulster cling on for valuable victory over Edinburgh

By PA
(Photo By Paul Devlin/Sportsfile via Getty Images)

Ulster withstood a late home onslaught to secure a narrow win which lifts them to fifth in the United Rugby Championship table and keeps alive their hopes of a home play-off.

ADVERTISEMENT

The losing bonus point guarantees Edinburgh’s involvement in the knockout stage of the season, but they will face a tricky away assignment in either Ireland or South Africa, depending on how the final round of matches pans out.

Edinburgh fired out of the blocks, with James Lang breaking from deep straight from the kick-off, although the centre picked up an injury when he was eventually stopped on halfway and had to be replaced.

Video Spacer

RugbyPass Offload | Episode 31

We’re joined by Springbok royalty, Siya Kolisi, who discusses his incredible journey to becoming one of the most iconic players the sport has ever seen. Siya discusses his career journey both on and off the pitch including – altercations off the filed, the genius of Rassie Erasmus as a coach and selector, URC vs super rugby, the possibility of moving to play in Europe, his thoughts on Boks joining six nations, resetting rugby pathway, an incredible impromptu supper with Gerald Buttler, Drinks with Jurgen Klopp & Roc Nations positive influence on rugby.

Video Spacer

RugbyPass Offload | Episode 31

We’re joined by Springbok royalty, Siya Kolisi, who discusses his incredible journey to becoming one of the most iconic players the sport has ever seen. Siya discusses his career journey both on and off the pitch including – altercations off the filed, the genius of Rassie Erasmus as a coach and selector, URC vs super rugby, the possibility of moving to play in Europe, his thoughts on Boks joining six nations, resetting rugby pathway, an incredible impromptu supper with Gerald Buttler, Drinks with Jurgen Klopp & Roc Nations positive influence on rugby.

It was frantic and physical stuff, with three more players having to leave the field either temporarily or permanently before the game was six minutes old. That included Edinburgh hooker Stuart McInally, who needed to go for an HIA after taking a blow to the head from Nick Timoney’s shoulder, with the Ulster flanker being sin-binned as a result.

Edinburgh looked dangerous when they got the ball in broken play but could not hold on to possession for long enough to really put Ulster under pressure.

Meanwhile, Ulster patiently turned the screw when they got into Edinburgh’s 22 around the 10-minute mark and were rewarded when winger Robert Baloucoune squeezed over on the right for the game’s opening try.

Nathan Doak added the conversion and then kicked two penalties as the visitors took control of the scoreboard, before Edinburgh rallied during the last few minutes of the half to finally get off the mark when Emiliano Boffelli fired home an offside penalty.

ADVERTISEMENT

Ulster really should have reclaimed their 13-point lead after three minutes of the restart, but Doak’s effort came back off the right post.

However, Edinburgh failed to clear their lines and the Ulster scrum-half got a second bite at the cherry a few minutes later following an off-the-ball push, and this time Doak nailed his shot at goal.

Edinburgh tightened their game up and set up camp on Ulster’s line, and a succession of penalties conceded by the visitors eventually led to a yellow card being shown to Alan O’Connor.

The home side kept plugging away and finally pulled it back to a six-point game when Mark Bennett chipped his man and raced through to ground the ball as it bounced over the line – but they could not get any closer despite their determined efforts in the closing stages.

ADVERTISEMENT
ADVERTISEMENT

LIVE

{{item.title}}

Trending on RugbyPass

Comments

0 Comments
Be the first to comment...

Join free and tell us what you really think!

Sign up for free
ADVERTISEMENT

Latest Features

Comments on RugbyPass

A
AM 40 minutes ago
'Freelancer' Izaia Perese shows the need for true inclusivity in Australian rugby

That's Cron's job though. Australia has had one of the most penalised scrums in international rugby for a long time. Just look at the scrum win loss percentage and scrum penalties. That is your evidence. AA has been the starter during that period. Pretty simple analysis. That Australia has had a poor scrum for a long time is hardly news. If bell and thor are not on the field they are woeful. So you are just plain wrong. They have very little time for the lions so doing the same old things that dont work is not going to get them there.


Ainsley is better than our next best tighthead options and has been playing well at scrum time for Lyon in the most competitive comp in the world. Superstar player? No. But better than the next best options. So that is a good enough guide. The scrummaging in the Prem is pretty good too so there is Sio's proof. Same analysis for him. Certainly better in both cases than Super, where the brumbies had the worst win loss and scrum pen in Super. Who plays there? Ohh yes... And the level of scrummaging in Super is well below the URC, prem and France with the SA teams out.


Nongorr is truly woeful. He's 130kg and gets shoved about. That just should not be happening at that weight for a specialist prop who has always played rugby cf pone with leauge. He has had enough time to develop at 23. You'd be better off with Pone who is at least good around the field for the moment and sending Nongorr on exchange to France or England to see if they can improve him with better coaching as happened with Skelton and Meafou. He isn't going to develop in time in super if he has it at all.


Latu is a better scrummaging hooker than BPA and Nasser. and he's the best aussie player over the ball at ruck time. McReight's super jackling percentage hasnt converted to international level but latu consistently does it at heniken level, which is similar to test level in the big games. With good coaching at La Rochelle he's much improved though still has the odd shocker. He should start the November games.

72 Go to comments
TRENDING
TRENDING Rassie Erasmus discusses idea of leaving Boks to coach another country Rassie Erasmus discusses idea of leaving Boks to coach another country
Search