Heineken Champions Cup Round of 16: Leinster 30 Ulster 15
They arrived in Dublin in their droves. With fingers and toes crossed the 7,000 plus strong Ulster support descended on the Aviva Stadium more in hope than in expectation. After suffering heartache after heartache against the boys in blue in countless league semi-finals and finals, maybe at long last, today was going to be their day. An Ulster win over Leinster when it really mattered.
Ten minutes on the clock and Nathan Doak kicked Ulster into a three-point lead. So far, so good.
But alas, it wasn’t to be as Leo Cullen’s side wore Ulster down by pinning them deep in their own half.
The blue juggernaut showed why they are again the favourites to add another Champions Cup to an already busting trophy cabinet in D4.
Tries from Ryan Baird, Jamison Gibson-Park and Andrew Porter confirmed Leinster’s sage passage to the last 16 and while Ulster crossed the whitewash twice themselves, they never really asked the Dubliners any serious questions.
“They are a good team, aren’t they?” said Ulster head coach McFarland afterwards.
“There was barely an occasion where they would make an error and give us some sort of access.
“But I was really proud of how our boys fronted up physically. I thought the preparation during the week in the lead up to this game was excellent. But on the day, you've got to be able to execute it to a really high level and be really precise when you are playing a team like Leinster.”
The rejuvenated Ross Byrne restored parity with a penalty in the 12th minute and from then on, there was only going to be one winner.
Leinster were dominating possession and they made it count on the scoreboard in the 20th minute when Baird powered over.
Another Byrne penalty pushed the gap out to 10 points, and just when Leinster were harbouring ideas of another routine win, Ulster responded in the most spectacular fashion.
Jacob Stockdale gathered his own kick in behind the Leinster backline. Quick ball and a pinpoint cross field kick from Billy Burns picked out James Hume, and the centre got over in the corner despite the best efforts of James Lowe.
Leinster dominated the remainder of the half but could add one further penalty to their tally for a 16-8 half-time lead.
Leinster controlled second half and added further tries through Gibson-Park and Porter.
Rob Herring’s try did offer a glimmer of hope, but in the end, Leinster came through what was potentially a banana skin, very comfortably.
Ulster battled gamely but left to rue an unusually high penalty count of 15. And when you are up against opposition of the calibre of Leinster, it can prove to be very costly.
“We probably lacked a little bit of discipline. That gave access and they were ruthless there, particularly off the back of our scores which didn’t really allow us to get any momentum into the game.”
The task for McFarland and his coaching team now is to try and close the gap that exists between the sides. Something which is easier said than done.
“They have 14 guys that literally play for the best team in the world and have just won a Grand Slam who are putting away international sides like, you know, it doesn’t matter.
“But we’ll keep on working on what we’re doing. We have some really good players. We’ve got some players we believe that can push their way into the Ireland team. The more we develop these players, the more players we get to that level, the more chance we have moving forward.”
