The Front Row Union Sport - U20 Championship: Catch up with the Ulster players.

U20 Championship: Catch up with the Ulster players.

Jun 4, 2017

—

We are currently carrying out a necessary behind-the-scenes upgrade to how images are stored and delivered on The Front Row Union Sports. With over 770,000 images on the site, we are moving our entire image library to a dedicated cloud storage service. This means images will load faster for you, regardless of where you are in the world, and the site will be more reliable overall.

As we are working on three separate versions of images during the offload process, the site cache sometimes struggles to keep up with which version to display and occasionally post grid images or complete galleries may fail to appear. This is a temporary side effect of the migration process — the image exists and is safe, it is simply in the process of being moved to its new home and identified as being there. A refresh of the page will usually bring them back, however, if it does not please contact john@thefrontrowunion.com stating clearly the post address and we will restore it as soon as possible. We apologise for any inconvenience this causes and appreciate your patience.

We expect the bulk of the image migration to be completed by the end of June 2026, with a fully upgraded version of the site ready to launch in August 2026. Once that work is done, the site will be noticeably faster, images will load more reliably, and you will not see any further disruption of this kind. Thank you for your continued support of The Front Row Union Sports.

We caught up with the Ulster players in the Ireland U20 squad out in Kutaisi, Georgia to find out how they are enjoying the experience so far.

We paired the guy’s up with their animal spirit guides and asked them a few questions! 😆

We asked Marcus Rea how they have found the U20 World Championship so far?

Marcus: It’s been good. It’s been tough enough adapting to the warm weather – it’s not like Belfast where it’s raining every other day.

The first game against Italy was a very fast flowing game. It was very tough to start off the campaign with a loss but hopefully, we can change that going into the Scotland game and get a five-pointer out of it.

Next up we had a word with Angus Curtis, who is one of five U19 players to be brought into the U20 squad, how he found that move?

Angus: I was initially apprehensive about coming into a new squad but all the boys have welcomed me, well of us really as there are a few U19 guys who moved up.

It’s a new challenge and I’m sure I’ll get my shot, I’ve just got to be patient and make the most of it when it comes.

Next up was the experienced Jonny Stewart who we aske about the differences between the U20 World Championship and the Six Nations?

Jonny: We’ve only played one game but the intensity is certainly higher, I think everyone has something different to play for in this tournament.

The Six Nations is spread out over seven weeks and we have time to think about each individual game whereas this one, it’s the nature of it that it’s so tied together with the games coming in quick succession and every match as to be a win.

Finally, we spoke to Peter Cooper and asked him what it felt like to be back in the squad after being injured for most of the latter part of the season?

Peter: It was a hard 12 weeks (being injured). Obviously, I was disappointed not to finish the Six Nations but my back just couldn’t take it any longer. I’ve worked hard after the op and it’s great to get back in the squad. Everyone has been really welcoming and have helped me get back in.

We’ve got a job to do now we are in Kutaisi, we’ve just got to win the next couple of games and then move on to the knock out stages in Tbilisi.

Obviously, the first game didn’t go as planned but we’ve recovered well and worked hard the last couple of days We’re looking forward to it!

Thanks to the players and the IRFU for making themselves available last night.

Angus Curtis Jonny Stewart Kutaisi Marcus Rea Peter Cooper