Scarlets v Ulster (SUFTUM) 29th October 2011 at Parc Y Scarlets KO 3.00pm

First topic message reminder :

Six of Ulster's World Cup players have gone straight into the starting XV to face Scarlets in the RaboDirect PRO12 tomorrow night at the Parc y Scarlets (kick off 3pm).
Head Coach Brian McLaughlin has made a total of seven personnel changes and two positional switches. Johann Muller returns to captain the side from the second row, where he is resumes his partnership with Dan Tuohy.

Ulster (15-9): S Danielli; A Trimble, N Spence, P Wallace, C Gilroy; I Humphreys, R Pienaar;
(1-8): T Court, A Kyriacou, D Fitzpatrick, J Muller (capt), D Tuohy, P Wannenburg, M McComish, C Henry;
Replacements (16-23): N Brady, P McAllister, A Macklin, L Stevenson, R Diack, P Marshall, D Cave, A D'Arcy

Scarlets team just put up on the Scarlet Fever forum, not on the Scarlets web site though,


15 Evans, 14 Liam Williams, 13 Lamont, 12 Warren, 11 Fenby, 10 A Thomas, 9 R Williams,
1 R Jones, 2 Owens, 3 R Thomas, 4 Day, 5 Welch, 6 McCusker (c), 7 Edwards, 8 Morgan

REPS: 16 Rees, 17 John, 18 Gardiner, 19 Shingler, 20 Pugh, 21 Knoyle, 22 Newton, 23 S Williams

6-3 but rhodri so slow

6-3 Scarlets. Seems deserved from the radio. Danielli having a shocker by the sounds of it and Ulster continuing were they left of against Treviso

13-3 Scarlets now. we are going backwards at a rate of knots this season.

Ulster knockin the ball on a lot but strong lineout. Scarlets good kickin by evans but very slow ball from rhodri williams, but he created a try for liam w by going through a ruck.

Very disillusioned with Ulster at the minute. I dont see (or hear) anything different from what i saw against Treviso, Dragons or Ospreys. I wonder if last year was a blip.

I think the game is pretty even,weather affectin it and ulster had a few chances.but could just b me -sitting in a cold wet stadium could b making me negative about scarlets

Think the WC has really hurt us and put the whole season off track. Payne out for the season also a disaster.

13-6 silly pen by scarlets

I wouldnt blame the RWC for it to be honest. Other teams have fewer resources than us and have been hit just as hard. A lot of Ulster players need to look at themselves.

Try out of nowhere from Trimble, 16-14 with conversion to come.

Did well as there is no TMO. Come on Ulster. An away win in wales will be a massive boost no matter how scrappy it is.

Awesome by adam warren

Have to say from what I've heard on the radio, we are genuine scum if we manage to win this match.

21-14 come on scarlets

Massive changes needed for Ulster. Some of these guys need to lose the jersey. See if they have the stones to win it back.

Humphreys kicks with a minute left and we are trailing by 7!!!!!!!!

He seriously needs dropped!

Well done Scarlets. well deserved.

Ulster need massive changes.

Standulstermen wrote:Well done Scarlets. well deserved.

Ulster need massive changes.

In coaching or players? The backs have looked clueless whenever I've seen them this year, its like watching Munster's backs at times and its worrying from an Irish perspective that two of our provinces aren't developing our backs in the way they should be. From listening today it sounded as if daneilli had a shocker but hes not a fullback so its not surprising, I really wish they'd give gaston a chance but I'd say that its probably to late at this stage so they'll go back to D'arcy who isn't the safest options and I'll be shi*ing it everytime the ball goes near him.

Didnt see the game I was too busy arguing with my ex partner...
But how on earth did the Scarlets win that game? Looking at the teams I thought the Scarlets were up for a hammering...

Yup, thought the same here. Did anyone see it? Apparently young Evans at 15 had a great game?

i think it is coaching Val. we have seen zero enterprise from ulster this season typified by our decision to play two 13 in the centre during the RWC and our 4th choice 12 on the wing.

Humphreys needs dropped imo. I know it wont happen so close to the HEC but his kicking and game management has been very poor. I actually feel sorry for Gilroy as he had as barely anything to do in the previous 6 games. Our pack has been monstered 4 times in a row (maybe not monstered today) but we need to ask are the players up to it? We are lightyears away from performances like Biarritz or Bath last season which were (while not without fault) massively aggressive displays.

Can anyone describe what function Neil Doak performs other than bringing the kicking tee on because i cant see it? i know we will get better but realistically we will struggle to finish in the top 2 of our heineken pool and the top 4 of the league. Our backrow in particular is dreadful and for the life of me i cant see what Willie Faloon has done to be dropped so completely. i am now dreading the Connacht game. If they win tonight they will have a good size gap to us.

McLaughlin opnly was given a one year contract iirc so he also needs results and quickly.

Didn't get to watch/hear the match. Sounds very disappointing indeed. Any players perform reasonably well? Were there any positives? The pack/backrow has been pathetic recently. The return of Best and Ferris will greatly improve that though I think.

Rory

i thought the presence of Muller and Court would help that but by God it seemed the usual old sh*t. While i wouldnt expect Pienaar to play as badly as he seemed to again we really are lacking in power up front. ferris will help but he cant do it all on his own

AlynDavies wrote:Didnt see the game I was too busy arguing with my ex partner...
But how on earth did the Scarlets win that game? Looking at the teams I thought the Scarlets were up for a hammering...

Afternoon folks
On a dark and damp evening up here in Musselburgh, Alyn you made me smile, few questions

1. Was she your partner before you started arguing?
2. I have been impressed with the Scarlets last 4-5 games, so do you think that Nigel Davies will bring the big guns back in or stay with the youngsters
3. I would play Schlong Lamont at 13 from now on with either Jon Davies or Scott Williams at 12
4. This Adam Warren looks good I was told he has scored 5 tries in the last 4 games, how good is he and should the established centres take over from him

Listened to Radio Ulster and thought it was quite a good game taking into account the weather

flyhalffactory wrote:Afternoon folks
On a dark and damp evening up here in Musselburgh, Alyn you made me smile, few questions

1. Was she your partner before you started arging?
2. I have been impressed with the Scarlets last 4-5 games, so do you think that Nigel Davies will bring the big guns back in or stay with the youngsters
3. I would play Schlong Lamont at 13 from now on with either Jon Davies or Scott Williams at 12
4. This Adam Warren looks good I was told he has scored 5 tries in the last 4 games, how good is he and should the established centres take over from him

Listened to Radio Ulster and thought it was quite a good game taking into account the weather

1. yes for 15 years, since school
2. I think the Scarlets have had a good pack all season with many first choice players but their back line has been so erratic and frustrating, I guess today was one of the days it all clicked, though with those backs they could just as easily lose at home to aironi by 20 points next week!
3. I wouldnt want to break up the Welsh centre pairing, one of them will go alongside Jamie roberts, so ideally both will play and get the chance to prove their on form.
4. He looks ok another talented player off the west wales production line.

Standulstermen wrote:Rory

i thought the presence of Muller and Court would help that but by God it seemed the usual old sh*t. While i wouldnt expect Pienaar to play as badly as he seemed to again we really are lacking in power up front. ferris will help but he cant do it all on his own

I have to agree with you stand about playing some of the younger players now such as Marshall, Jackson, Gaston etc.. I don't agree with the "out with the old, in with the new" extremes that some people want, where even old players who are still showing great form should be dropped for a younger player, however I do think changes must be made here. If the old players aren't performing, the worst thing a coach can do is persist because he doesn't trust his more youthful options (this has happened to many players in Ireland over the past while). If the experienced players aren't performing, he must try his younger players and show some trust in them for a change.

Standulstermen wrote:i think it is coaching Val. we have seen zero enterprise from ulster this season typified by our decision to play two 13 in the centre during the RWC and our 4th choice 12 on the wing.

Humphreys needs dropped imo. I know it wont happen so close to the HEC but his kicking and game management has been very poor. I actually feel sorry for Gilroy as he had as barely anything to do in the previous 6 games. Our pack has been monstered 4 times in a row (maybe not monstered today) but we need to ask are the players up to it? We are lightyears away from performances like Biarritz or Bath last season which were (while not without fault) massively aggressive displays.

Can anyone describe what function Neil Doak performs other than bringing the kicking tee on because i cant see it? i know we will get better but realistically we will struggle to finish in the top 2 of our heineken pool and the top 4 of the league. Our backrow in particular is dreadful and for the life of me i cant see what Willie Faloon has done to be dropped so completely. i am now dreading the Connacht game. If they win tonight they will have a good size gap to us.

McLaughlin opnly was given a one year contract iirc so he also needs results and quickly.

Its being a disappointing weekend so far for the Irish sides in terms of performances. Ulster's season could be over before it starts if they don't get together soon, jackson is probably too raw to be thrown into the Hec but I wonder if it would be an idea to play wallace at 10 and then you can have spence and cave in the centre, pienaar will still take the kicks.

Did I hear right that Gilroy has an injury as well? The next three weeks are crucial for the rest of the season and its really disappointing how poor this season has been so far.

Spence and Cave together in the centres is just another one of the problems with selection. They are both outside centres. Wallace or Marshall should be starting at 12.

Rory_Gallagher wrote:Spence and Cave together in the centres is just another one of the problems with selection. They are both outside centres. Wallace or Marshall should be starting at 12.

Marshall is injured and humpreys isn't playing well.

Jackson to 10, Wallace at 12. Simple! Wallace is not good at 10. Even Pienaar at 10 should be an option before Wallace.

AlynDavies wrote:


2. I think the Scarlets have had a good pack all season with many first choice players but their back line has been so erratic and frustrating, I guess today was one of the days it all clicked, though with those backs they could just as easily lose at home to aironi by 20 points next week!
3. I wouldnt want to break up the Welsh centre pairing, one of them will go alongside Jamie roberts, so ideally both will play and get the chance to prove their on form.
4. He looks ok another talented player off the west wales production line.

The Scarlets backs were awful at the start of the season, since dropping Rhodri Gomer-Davies and playing Aled Thomas at 10 only, they've improved considerably, not sure why they'd lose to Aironi next week after already beating them this season.


As for keeping Shlong at centre----no chance! he's there as an emergency centre only, with the emergence of Adam Warren we've now got 4 very talented youngsters, only Nick Reynolds out of those 4 hasn't had the chance to prove himself due to injury.


Ulster, wow what can I say, last season you'd have beaten that team by 20, something's not right there and with so much young talent it's a real shame.

Rory_Gallagher wrote:Jackson to 10, Wallace at 12. Simple! Wallace is not good at 10. Even Pienaar at 10 should be an option before Wallace.

Jackson isn't ready yet, he has huge potential but to throw him in to hec so early wouldn't be the right move. The different between pienaar and marshall at 9 is greater than the difference between pienaar and wallace at 10. Spence would be able to make a good job at 12 as long as he plays with cave. Its not ideal but it comes down to the best use of resources.

Then again we know that humpreys will be at 10 so this is discussion all hypothetical and unlikely to actually happen.

RED face of Ulstuur?

Fantastic win for Scarlets kids v practically Ulsters 1st team. They are growing in confidence. What will they be like when their Welsh contingent get back?

Man. With Treviso slaying the Dragons today, its going to be an interesting PRO12 and HC.

Well done Scarlets. Hard luck Ulster. Pressure is growing on McLaughlin. IS he the man? May need help. Best coming back should help.Miss him and his leadership badly.

Gibson wrote:RED face of Ulstuur?

Fantastic win for Scarlets kids v practically Ulsters 1st team. They are growing in confidence. What will they be like when their Welsh contingent get back?

Man. Its going to be an interesting PRO12 and HC.

Well done Scarlets. Hard luck Ulster. Pressure is growing on McLaughlin. IS he the man? May need help. Best coming back should help.Miss him and his leadership badly.

Best and Ferris will help because the pack are getting beaten up but a lot of the team selections have been perplexing to say the least. On it be an interesting pro12/hec, it could be over in the next three weeks.

Val,
It will swing back and forth man. Long way to go yet. Teams, like Ulster, just need a good run. (cliche Heaven). HC will alter the balance, with top players being rested for it. I see 6 teams capable of winning it. Great stuff.

Lot of silly knee jerk reactions here.

We'll get better but it will take time and I'm pretty unhappy and not very confident that McLaughlin is surrounded by good enough coaches to get the best out of this team in Neil Doak and Allen Clarke who have no pedigree of doing anything else in rugby outside Ulster. Muller is ostensibly our forwards coach and not having a forwards coach during the RWC (we definitely weren't expecting him to go) really screwed our coaching team up.

I'm not surprised by the performance really, because of the serious lack of confidence in the backline thats been evident. Bringing three top quality players who have played nearly no rugby and have about a weeks training isn't going to magically cure things overnight when we're up against a team that have been playing together regularly. Pienaar and Wallace certainly will need at least one more game before they start performing. Danielli at fullback was a stupid decision, its not his position. And Humphreys is having a bit of a crisis of confidence.

The main thing our coaches and senior players need to do is restore confidence in the rest of the team. You don't drop players because that actually exacerbates the problem. You certainly don't deep-end youngsters when the team as a whole is lacking confidence especially when the likes of Jackson and Marshall have had poor games thrown in at the deep end; that being what started our slide in form in the first place! You stick with the same players and we definitely should. That will take time and patience and I would pretty much pick the exact same team for Connacht; three changes would be D'Arcy in and Best and Ferris if they are available.

Jackson is too raw for the Heineken in fairness. Marshalls injury is unfortunate but then we dont seem to want to play him either. Im sorry Rodders but spence isnt having the season you seem to think he is. I dont think it is entirely his fault as he is being employed as a bosher and we arent subtle enough to use other options.

Our handling and skills have been appalling truth be told.
The contrast betweem the Scarlets and Ulster is that they have trusted youngsters. Our future 10 and 12 have only played as a result of injuries to others and it is hampering their development. We have seen nothing of Gaston this season 9is this down to injury?) and we picked our back up hooker before trusting in one of two young props to shore up a scrum. The essence is though that we have been bullied up front (wasnt entirely the case today). Chris Henry, Wannenburg, Tuohy, Kyriacou, Diack, Barker and Stevenson all need a good look at themselves because they are being made to look weak and underpowered on a continual basis.

Gibson

im not convinced McLaughlin is the man in all honesty but he deserves the season. Im not sure about the mechanics of the ulster coaching system and im not certain what role HumphSnr is playing as regards what happens on the pitch but we look stupid having got rid of Jeremy Davidson and not really replaced him.

Our crisis in the backs comes from a gameplan of giving the ball to Spence and asking him to truck it up, recycle and repeat.

Faloon needs to come back in as does Ferris, Best, D'arcy and i would drop Chris Henry. Lets pick a balanced backrow, give Muller a week to light a fire under their ass and see where it takes us. Humph will of course start but if we are picking him on the basis that he will screw up less then i despair. Paul Marshall needs dropped from the squad though. Gusher announced he came on and in the next two sentences he lamented two dreadful passes.

My reactions may well be knee jerk but someone needs to have them because the players have shown zero reaction to four defeats on the trot as well as losing to an Italian team at Ravenhill!

We're picking Humph on the basis that it will probably be a couple of years before Jackson is good enough to win games for us in his own right whereas Humph has done in the past. If we've any hope of not being out of the Heineken Cup in three weeks Humph must come good. Jackson simply and indisputably isn't ready to face a team like Clermont Auvergne or go to Welford Road and won't be until he gets more experience. He's been given good exposure so far and will learn a lot from it if guided right but we'd be asking too much of him.

What we need is Humphreys to improve. We could move Pienaar or Wallace to 10 but the simple truth is Marshall isn't good enough to cover for Pienaar and Spence, Whitten or Luke Marshall aren't good enough to fill in for Paddy Wallace.

You see, you've put the cart before the horse. We've simplified our backs gameplan because our players lack confidence to be pull off more ambitious rugby. The source of this lack of confidence is lack of good service from 9-10-12- unacceptably poor basic distribution skills at the heart of our team mean the only things we can reliably do are the kick and chase and crash ball and even then we seem to struggle with our handling because the passing is so poor. Doak started at Ulster as 'Skills Coach'... you have to wonder like. Wallace and Pienaar will go a long way towards solving the problems at 9 and 12 mind you. Right now both are ring-rusty at most things bar holding tackle bags but are high quality passers of a rugby ball and we'll see that quality come back into our game with any luck.

Be patient with Luke Marshall. He will become our best 12 in the near future- unfortunately in his cameos he's shown the coaches were right not to select him from the outset. His jaw is broken now anyway. Our coaches biggest mistake has been to neglect Ian Porter- his pass isn't jaw-droppingly good like Pienaars at his best but Paul Marshall makes him look like Gareth blydi Edwards. Paul Marshall indeed has no place in the 23-man squad of a side at this level.

Anyway, I'm off for the night. Ciao.

I agree with a lot of what you say Notch. Marshall has been a massive problem.

The problem with the distributio nfrom 12 is that we picked a crash ball centre there. i disagree that we can use the crash ball as we only have one exponent of it and he has been targetted mercilessly. I do agree that Humph is the right option for the Heineken but if we are due an early exit from it (which is looking likely at present) then i see no point in not giving jackson/marshall the gametime. Im certainly not calling for us to drop wallace but if things go badly this side of christmas in the HEC i would like to see Pienaar-Wallace-Marshall or Pienaar-jackson-Wallace get plenty of gametime in the new year.

hello.

My you Ulster fans panic a lot.
You weren't actually that bad today (at least not in the forwards, espescially seeing as you had to reshuffle your front row before ko). You are very aggressive at the breakdown and caused us all sorts of problems there although you did err on the wrong side of the whistle a few too many times. Your scrum and lineout for the most part worked really well. You just had very little creativity in your backs.

Never play Danielli at full back again. He didn't look comfortable there, and in comparison to Dan Evs' tactical kicking he was woeful. I very rarely saw your centres get the ball. It was all kick and chase so that's deffo one thing for your guys to improve on.

I'm still a bit angry that Trimble managed to get his try. You wouldn't believe how stupid the Scarlets were to let him score!

It was a clever kick through into space, but Jonothan Edwards had plenty of time to touch the ball down in the try area before Trimble got there. But NO. He had to go and wait and keep hoping it would bounce dead. Then Trimble got the ball grounded first. It was ludicrous, that try should never have happened, put the Scarlets under all sorts of pressure, completely daft. Great chase by Trimble though.


From a Scarlets perspective I am really happy. Liam Williams in the first half was outstanding. Great breaks, great chasing, up in defence and took his try really well. Can feel hard done by to be subbed off for Scott Williams.

Dan Evans is continuing his good form and his tactical kicking is brilliant. Helped take loads of the pressure off our forwards with his deep, territory winning kicks.

Adam Warren - took his try really well, the guy can't stop scoring!

Aled THomas - really fitting in well into the team now, some great kicks at goal, and helped release Monty and Fenby really well in th e backs.

Smiler, Tav and Scott - the atmosphere when these guys came onto the pitch was incredible, you could just feel it, I think it really helped our team for them to call on in the 2nd half.

Down point: our forwards are still a bit lazy, really need to work more at protecting teh ball at the breakdown, but Rob Gog and Welch both had big, big games today. Ben Morgan still needs to learn how to take the ball into contact without spilling it.

I'd say our main weaknesses is the painfully slow service from Rhodri Williams (he needs another season or 2 in the Prem) and the silly errors and knock ons we made, turning promising positions into putting pressure on us. But decent perfomance and so nice to see Owens, Rees and Fenby back,

True Smirnoff. Was bellowing at Rhodri at times to just get the ball out, he did improve as the game went on though.

The conditions were appalling first half so I can sort of forgive some of the knockons, but not the stupid penalties. But both sides were guilty of that, was actually thinking at one point that both teams were lucky not to see Yellows.

Fenby had an okay game, but think he takes too much on himself sometimes, wish he'd look around to see if there are other options sometimes! Still, considering I was settling for a LBP before the match, I'm well happy with the result.

I'm happy too, but you should have seen, at the game almost the whole crowd was screaming at Rhodri Williams to get the ball out - he'd look, wave at the ref, wave at the players, look again, step closer, wave at the players, go pick up the ball, pause and then pass - by which time Ulster were on our 1st reciever. The whole crowd were just screaming "Get it Away!!!"

Though Welch, McCusker, Liam, Warren and Evans all had excellent games, which is good. And our midfield is going to be really good - I just can't wait to get a really good half back pairing back to really set them loose. The game speeded up so much when Knoyle came on.

Appalling conditions though - I was soaked

yeah I got fairly drenched standing in the enclosure, not too bad though

Was hugely impressed by Welch actually, really hope he gets a run of games for us now.

To real fans who actually GO to games. In schitt weather.

Believe.

I didn't realise you made it dreamer.

I'm hoping Welch manages to play a run of games to that standard - I can't believe he's my age, I keep thinking he's early 20's...

I think once we get our internationals back we ain't got a bad team, and hopefully Stoddart will be back in a week or 2

yeah, I made it, wouldn't have missed this one, just so glad we managed to get the win. This is the exact sort of game we'd have lost last year so it's a huge step up for us imo.

Is Stodds really due back that soon?? awesome if he is!

I read it somewhere, I think it was on the Scarlets website on a story about Dale Fords leg break. It's awesome if it is true (I'm pretty sure it is).

So true that we would have lost this last season,I'm so impressed with the handling skills of our youngsters in the backs. And our forwards really had the upper hand in the scrums.

I'm glad that Murphy will provide competition for Morgan as well, I hope Morgan can rediscover his form from last season