Nathan Doak converted skipper Alan O’Connor’s 79th-minute try as Ulster boosted their United Rugby Championship play-off hopes with a 30-28 win over Scarlets.
Ulster ended a five-match losing run in all competitions with a dogged 17-7 United Rugby Championship win at Connacht.
Olympian Zac Ward is set to start on the wing for Emerging Ireland on Wednesday against the Pumas in Bloemfontein.
England U20s may have won the ultimate prize but Ireland's young conveyor belt of talent shows no sign of grinding to a halt
Sunday at the World Rugby U20 Championship in Cape Town began with a blue sky, quite the contrast to match day there’s brutal weather, and it stayed dry, encouraging teams to give it a lash.
Two points up at the break, Mark Mapletoft’s side took a firm grip on the previously frenetic exchanges and the second period became a slow death for the Irish.
They also confirmed that skipper Evan O’Connell, the nephew of Paul O'Connell who last took the field in the July 4 pool win over Georgia, has been ruled out for the remainder of the tournament through injury.
The Irish looked set to be beaten as they had surrendered an early 12-0 lead and were trailing 15-16 and were fortunate not to be 15-22 behind as the Eastern Europeans missed a pair of kickable penalties when tensing up coming down the finishing straight.
The Irish were impressive 55-15 opening day winners over Italy last Saturday at DHL Stadium and Willie Faloon has now changed four forwards and three backs for Thursday’s clash with Georgia in Stellenbosch.
Australia felt hard done by in their round two loss to Ireland in Paarl because in the aftermath of their 10-30 defeat, Irish back-rower James McNabney was cited and banned for foul play that happened in the 35th minute that was missed by the officials in real time.