Ulster failed to fire on Friday night in their return to Magners League action, scraping a draw in a frustrating match against the Dragons. Watching CEO, Shane Logan, must mow have some idea of the scope of the work required to implement his master plan to make Ulster the “Best in the World”!
If you are a regular reader of our match reports I’m afraid you’re not going to read anything new here as it was the recurrent problem of the front five failing to dominate that came back to haunt Ulster as they missed out on the opportunity to kick start their move towards a play off place.
As I’ve said time and time again this season, the front five are crucial if you are going to win matches at this level. Team defences are so well drilled these days that unless your pack put you on the front foot it’s increasingly difficult to make any ground as defences rush up to tackle just as the ball arrives. Quick front foot ball gives the attacking team that little bit of extra time and space to work their magic.
The Ulster front five appear to switch their effort on and off throughout the season. Give them a perceived big team, like Stade, Bath or Leinster and they are all switched on and concentrating, hitting rucks and mauls in twos and threes, driving their opponents back and putting them on the back foot. It’s brilliant when they do it and you can almost taste the increased sense of urgency and team work.
Unfortunately when it’s a lesser team they tend to switch it off a bit, pull back on the big hits, join the rucks in dribs and drabs and relax slightly, thinking that with their superior skills someone else will eventually win the day. They are all professional rugby players and they all put in their shift, look at individual performances and it would be hard to fault them, but it’s that slight tangible difference between a team effort and individual effort that makes all the difference.
This attitude is made all the more understandable given that Ulster have one of the most attacking backlines around and certainly on Friday night Wallace and Cave made enough breaks on their own to comfortably win the game. Unfortunately these breaks were not supported by the pack and fizzled out either with a penalty conceded, or the ball turned over, or possession so slow that the Dragons were able to have a cup of tea and a sandwich as they re-organised their defence.
The Dragons, however, gave a consummate display in front five play, with captain Luke Charteris leading by example. They tackled ferociously throughout the game, hit rucks in pairs and generally made a nuisance of themselves at every breakdown. Thankfully for Ulster, and unfortunately for the Dragons, their backs didn’t have the firepower to back up their impressive effort.
While Logan’s “Best in the World” statement (oh how the Welsh commentary team sniggered at that one) may be more reminiscent of an inexperienced 2nd Lieutenant leading his troops out of the trenches for a death or glory charge, the fact remains that, while we may be a long way off being the “Best in the World”, we can certainly be a lot better than we currently are.
Match pictures by Rugby Picture. Click here.
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