By all accounts the game was a dross affair
with the rain-swept Scottish capital looking more like the trenches of Normandy
than it did the usual grandeur of Murrayfield. A rather unfitting tribute to
the iconic Murrayfield turf which is being removed and replaced in the next few
days, and the planned invasion of the pitch was probably quite subdued
considering the result.
The game itself mirrored the atrocious
weather it was played in, a forwards-dominated, try-less encounter which turned
out to be a battle of the boots with Paddy Jackson emerging the victor over his
opposing number Carl Bezuidenhout. That was definitely one positive taken from
the evening anyway: should Ruan Pienaar not make the Saracens game in two weeks
(touch wood he does) at least Jackson seems to have his kicking boots polished
and ready to go.
It was a game that was about getting the win
and not getting anybody injured in the process – yes, I’m talking about a
certain Stephen Ferris – and Ulster achieved that. Edinburgh can be a bit of a
banana skin team, especially at Murrayfield, and on the other side it is rather
relieving that the game is out of the way. Our record hasn’t exactly been
stellar in Scotland either, so those are four welcome points in our bid to
finish in the top four.
We’re not exactly setting the world alight
with our rugby at the moment, but arguably we don’t need to. We’ve slowly
climbed the table now, sitting in third place just three points behind Munster
who were runaway leaders at one point, and we’ve got the winning momentum going
ahead of Saracens next week. Certainly a home semi-final in the Pro12 isn’t
beyond us, and with both Leinster and Munster to face us in our final two games
of the season, I’m sure the management team haven’t given up on the possibility
of top spot for the second season running.
In fact, Friday night may be a bigger win
than many people realise. On a terrible night for rugby the game could easily
have swung either way yet we managed to stand firm when up against it and leave
with the four points we needed. That’s the hallmark of great teams: even when
you’re playing badly you can grind out the results required. This season we’ve
done that, and if we can get a few good performances together then who knows
what’s achievable for this team?
Onwards and upwards I say!
Quarter-final
quivers
I don’t exactly rate BT Sport’s coverage of
rugby that highly (especially the top quality “analysis” from Austin Healey)
but I was forced to watch Saracens against Harlequins on BT Sport, and
unfortunately the home team (playing at Wembley) were very good. Very good
indeed. Five tries they scored and five points they earned – they will be
formidable opponents in the quarter-final.
Harlequins didn’t exactly put up much of a
resistance, throwing two ridiculous passes for intercept tries and only really
threatening from their driving maul when they had a man advantage, but even so,
Saracens showed why they are leaders of the Premiership and even now you can
tell that next week’s game will be a cracker.
I still think you’d be a brave man to bet
against the home team though. Although Saracens will be a step above Leicester
(who had an equally impressive win on Sunday), winning runs do a lot for
confidence, and we still haven’t been defeated in 2014. Admittedly, we should
definitely not be complacent as Saracens will pose us the most questions
anybody has thus far this season, but by the same token, we should still win
the game at the renovated Ravenhill with 18,000 Ulstermen behind the boys.
Confidence does a lot for a team – our
confidence last season carried us through two matches away in Italy where we
didn’t play well at all but we still escaped with the wins, and you could argue
we’ve done the same thing recently against the Ospreys and Treviso too.
Nevertheless, all the pressure is on us as the home team – we are expected to
win, and if we don’t there will be questions asked.
Still, I’ll leave the in-depth build up for
that game for next week’s blog, there’s a heck of a lot more I could talk about
without even scratching the surface of what will be the biggest game of
Ulster’s season so far, and will be the first of a huge run of games which will
determine where and who we play in the latter stages of the season.
And of course, hopefully that includes a
Heineken Cup semi in Dublin – sorry Sarries!
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