PRO12 - ULSTER v SCARLETS

First topic message reminder :

At Ravespan Stadium, 7:05pm. Live on BBC Sport NI/BBC Wales

Referee: Ben Whitehouse (WRU, 27th competition game)
Assistant Referees: Cammy Rudkin (SRU), Shane Kierans (IRFU)
Citing Commissioner: Eddie Walsh (IRFU)
TMO: Charles Samson (SRU)


The last time the Ulstermen started a PRO12 campaign with three straight victories was in season 2012/13, where they did not lose their first match until round 12.

Ulster have lost just once at Kingspan Stadium since early January: 20-21 to Scarlets on 21 February.

Scarlets have won only one of their last six Guinness PRO12 fixtures: over Newport Gwent Dragons on “Judgement Day” in April.

Scarlets only victory in their last twelve visits to an Irish province in any tournament was in Belfast in February.

Scarlets won both matches against Ulster in the Guinness PRO12 last season but have never won three in a row against the Irish province.

Overall Guinness PRO12 head to head record:
Played 27, Ulster won 14, Scarlets won 11 and 2 games drawn.

ULSTER MATCH DAY SQUAD
15 C Piutau
14 C Gilroy
13 S Olding
12 S McCloskey
11 L Ludik
10 P Jackson
9 R Pienaar

1 C Black
2 R Herring (captain)
3 R Ah You
4 P Browne
5 A O'Connor
6 C Ross
7 S Reidy
8 R Diack

Replacements (16-23): J Andrew, A Warwick, R Kane, F van der Merwe, I Henderson, A Lloyd, L Marshall, R Lyttle.

SCARLETS MATCH DAY SQUAD
15 A Thomas
14 L Williams
13 Jonathan Davies
12 H Parkes
11 S Evans
10 R Patchell
9 G Davies

1 W Jones
2 K Owens (capt)
3 W Kruger
4 J Ball
5 D Bulbring
6 L Rawlins
7 James Davies
8 J Barclay

Replacements: R Elias, L Garrett, P Edwards, T Beirne, W Boyde, Aled Davies, S Williams, S Hughes.

Great crowd given it was Culture Night in Belfast. Impressive.

Our determination to keep the ball alive was most enjoyable to watch. Need to keep a cool head, though. Piutau seems to have been infected with Ulster "panic stations".

Liam Williams really tremendous. Thought the Ulster centres were comfortably better than their Scarlet counterparts - surely coasting on past glories. Thought the Ulster pack aren't as bad as commonly accused.

Think Scarlets will turn it around and would be entirely unsurprised  to lose at the Parc later in the season.

I think Scarlets start to the season was summed up by the pass to Scott Williams who was looking in the opposite direction.

They defended well, but certainly looked second best, not very adventurous in attack.

Anyone know why Ball was sin binned, the reports say kicking the ball in a ruck. But I thought that playing the ball with your feet is what players are suposed to do. I have watched the replay and it didn't look dangerous, so why is this foul play, which law is he transgressing?

Seagultaf wrote:Anyone know why Ball was sin binned, the reports say kicking the ball in a ruck. But I thought that playing the ball with your feet is what players are suposed to do. I have watched the replay and it didn't look dangerous, so why is this foul play, which law is he transgressing?

As far as I remember he kicked the ball out of the ruck which is illegal. It was his 3rd penalty too so the yellow was obvious

Cheers 2ndtimeround - very gracious

That Scarlets team has most of the elements of a successful unit and it needed Ulster to play out of their skins to win the game. The difference in the result was at half back.
Pienaar showed yet again how measured he is in his decision making and it is little wonder that the Ulster faithful are mourning his departure at the end of the season. I'm a fan of Gareth Davies but his play is always a bit frenetic and only really excels when his forwards are giving him front foot options. His namesake Aled looks a more solid option until the game shows signs of losing its structure, at which point Gareth coming off the bench would offer real impact - his break would probably have been a try against a flagging defence and there was zero chance of him passing the ball with the line beckoning as it did for Aled.

I'm a big fan of Patchell, as he has all the attributes to one day be the best 10 in Wales, but he is obviously low on confidence. and struggling to find the rhythm of the Scarlets game. Jackson had his best decision making game for Ulster, which was impressive considering it was his first start of the season - but he knows most of the players around him, their pace and positioning. At times Patchell was scanning rather than acting because the players weren't where he though they would be. Pivac could do worse than play him at 12 until he gets the rhythm of the team around him.

As for the Liam Williams/Gilroy incident - the great thing about rugby is that the referee adjudicates what is right and what is wrong. I watched the incident on NASA quality ultra super high quantum definition TV with TMO transducer (a meter that tells you a players intent) and Williams' intent was to stop Gilroy in whatever way he could without giving away a penalty. If the ref had given a penalty he would have been just as right as not giving one. Anyway Williams had a great game and wasn't going to let Gilroy run rings around him the way he did two seasons ago.

Just catching up now- any news on Luke Marshall?

Good to see the progression in Jackson's kicking game. He's looking good already

Notch wrote:Just catching up now- any news on Luke Marshall?

Someone on the other forum suggests a neck injury rather than concussion, but I thought he was sparked out. Hopefully it isn't concussion. He did look in fine form after the game.

The strike move off the scrum that nearly put Gilroy in in the corner really deserved a try. And the try saving tackle from Williams was as good to be fair.

I'm pretty optimistic about Ulster at the moment. Defence has been stingy, halfbacks look good, set piece looks good and we've shown the attacking ability we have in fits and starts. If anything, its disappointing we've only scored the 10 tries and gotten 1 TBP! Not a bad sign when thats the biggest worry you have but obviously next week the difficulty goes up a gear- we're definitely not as good as we could be yet so next week would be a good time to go up a level!

Ulster looked very threatening all over the pitch I thought, Olding is a cracking wee player, isn't he?

EST wrote:Ulster looked very threatening all over the pitch I thought, Olding is a cracking wee player, isn't he?

He really is. He's just a natural born rugby player, with the full repertoire of skills.

Munchkin wrote:

Notch wrote:Just catching up now- any news on Luke Marshall?

Someone on the other forum suggests a neck injury rather than concussion, but I thought he was sparked out. Hopefully it isn't concussion. He did look in fine form after the game.

I thought it was a neck injury as well. Initially it looked as if he had been knocked out but on second viewing he seems to have jarred his neck. Hopefully we will get some news soon though.

Scarlets did better than expected. Had Aled Davies scored when the try line was beckoning then the Scarlets could have gone on to win the game. The Scarlets did well to lose by such a small margin. Before the game I was expecting Ulster to win comfortably.

Rhys Patchell's goal kicking was poor. I think Aled Thomas deserves to start at ten against Connacht next week and deserves to have the kicking duties as well.

Notch wrote:

EST wrote:Ulster looked very threatening all over the pitch I thought, Olding is a cracking wee player, isn't he?

He really is. He's just a natural born rugby player, with the full repertoire of skills.

Hopefully he can string some games together this season, such a talent.

Scarlets played really well defensively, and Liam Williams prevented us scoring three Try's. He's an intelligent and cute player.

I'm happy with the result because I know there's much more to come, although I'm not very confident we are ready for next weeks game.
Our defending the maul was disappointing, as was conceding turnovers. Piutau is a special talent, but he needs to work a bit on his pass. The line-out was a big improvement on the week before, but we never really challenged Scarlets. Very happy with the scrum, but there's bigger challenges to come.

Jacksons kicking for territory was superb. I think the pace of the game caught up with him, but to be expected on his first game back. Actually, I think a few of our players are being caught out with the pace, as the energy levels drop in the second half.

It was disappointing we didn't kill the game off until the very last play. We had our chances. But on another night Gilroy would have had a couple of tries, only some very good last ditch defending stopped him.

Scarlets are a good team, much better than three losses would suggest. I just wonder if they and Connacht will regret their slow starts come the end of the season. It's going to be really tight this year with the possible resurgence of Munster and the Blues.

international198 wrote:Scarlets did better than expected. Had Aled Davies scored when the try line was beckoning then the Scarlets could have gone on to win the game. The Scarlets did well to lose by such a small margin. Before the game I was expecting Ulster to win comfortably.

neilthom7 wrote:

Seagultaf wrote:Anyone know why Ball was sin binned, the reports say kicking the ball in a ruck. But I thought that playing the ball with your feet is what players are suposed to do. I have watched the replay and it didn't look dangerous, so why is this foul play, which law is he transgressing?

As far as I remember he kicked the ball out of the ruck which is illegal.  It was his 3rd penalty too so the yellow was obvious

I agree that's what the ref said, but I am not aware of any rugby Law which states this, on the contrary the laws actually state that players should play the ball with their feet in a ruck.

Any refs out there who can advise on this?

Seagultaf wrote:

neilthom7 wrote:

Seagultaf wrote:Anyone know why Ball was sin binned, the reports say kicking the ball in a ruck. But I thought that playing the ball with your feet is what players are suposed to do. I have watched the replay and it didn't look dangerous, so why is this foul play, which law is he transgressing?

As far as I remember he kicked the ball out of the ruck which is illegal.  It was his 3rd penalty too so the yellow was obvious

I agree that's what the ref said, but I am not aware of any rugby Law which states this, on the contrary the laws actually state that players should play the ball with their feet in a ruck.

Any refs out there who can advise on this?

Seems like you can do this if legally bound to a ruck, however in this case the ball had already left the ruck and was at the scrum-halves feet. It's at the stage when the ball is at the back of the ruck and the team in possession have five seconds to play it.

Just a few seconds before the call against Ball (heh) a Scarlets player kicks the ball out of the ruck and Ben Whitehouse says "He's part of it (the ruck), that's fine." Then Ball who is also part of the ruck does something very similar and is pinged. As I said the difference appears to be that the ruck has ended? There doesn't seem to anything about this in Law 16 (The Ruck) on the World Rugby website. The Ulster commentator suggested it is the result of an edict by the governing body.

Tbh, I don't know. It certainly 'looks wrong' but the more I look at it the more I think he may be hard done by. I don't know anything about this edict that was mentioned, but it's a fraction of a second between the ball being in the ruck or out of it.

It's worth mentioning the yellow was due to a cumulation of penalties as opposed to that specific offence.

Indeed this clarification from World Rugby states;

"When a scrum half attempts to retrieve the ball from a ruck, the ball is not out until that player has picked the ball up from the ground."

http://laws.worldrugby.org/?domain=9&guideline=7

They also clarify it's illegal to kick the ball out of a players hands in any circumstances, but pretty sure Pienaars hands were not on the ball and he had not picked it up, so still a ruck- and Ball appeared to be legally bound. Nothing about kicking the ball away before the scrum-half picks it up on the World Rugby website I can find. Not sure where yer man got that one from tbh.

Only just managed to watch the first half (bloody work and family) but my word some of the handling was impressive. And Charlie p is just phenomenal. How we didn't score more I don't know, well Williams defence is one reason and I so want to hate him but he is quality.
If players stay fit and corteez cones back strong we will cause some dammage

carpet baboon wrote:
If players stay fit and corteez cones back strong we will cause some dammage

Spanish ice cream vendour?

St John The Enforcer wrote:

carpet baboon wrote:
If players stay fit and corteez cones back strong we will cause some dammage

Spanish ice cream vendour?

Long day followed by a bottle of rioja.

Seagultaf wrote:

neilthom7 wrote:

Seagultaf wrote:Anyone know why Ball was sin binned, the reports say kicking the ball in a ruck. But I thought that playing the ball with your feet is what players are suposed to do. I have watched the replay and it didn't look dangerous, so why is this foul play, which law is he transgressing?

As far as I remember he kicked the ball out of the ruck which is illegal.  It was his 3rd penalty too so the yellow was obvious

I agree that's what the ref said, but I am not aware of any rugby Law which states this, on the contrary the laws actually state that players should play the ball with their feet in a ruck.

Any refs out there who can advise on this?

It's a Law change brought in this season to stop the dangerous practice of kicking through that became increasingly popular last season.

The Great Aukster wrote:

Seagultaf wrote:

neilthom7 wrote:

Seagultaf wrote:Anyone know why Ball was sin binned, the reports say kicking the ball in a ruck. But I thought that playing the ball with your feet is what players are suposed to do. I have watched the replay and it didn't look dangerous, so why is this foul play, which law is he transgressing?

As far as I remember he kicked the ball out of the ruck which is illegal.  It was his 3rd penalty too so the yellow was obvious

I agree that's what the ref said, but I am not aware of any rugby Law which states this, on the contrary the laws actually state that players should play the ball with their feet in a ruck.

Any refs out there who can advise on this?

It's a Law change brought in this season to stop the dangerous practice of kicking through that became increasingly popular last season.

Thanks for that, do you have a link to this Law change? This incident has caused a lot of debate, fuelled partly by the ref saying it was OK if the player was bound into the ruck, in an earlier incident in the same game.

I was afraid Ulster would win by 30 to 40 points. The Scarlets did well to lose by only 11 points, IMO. If Rhys Patchell would have kicked all of his kicks at goal we would have lost by less than 11 points I would imagine.

It seemed to me everytime Steph Evans and Pratchell got tackled they were turned over, it is time to diitch Pratchell as he also weak in the tackle. I wonder why the Blues defence has improved?

Lee Williams is playing well for Carmarthen Quins. 5 tries in 3 games. Why not bring him into the Scarlets XV?

international198 wrote:I was afraid Ulster would win by 30 to 40 points. The Scarlets did well to lose by only 11 points, IMO. If Rhys Patchell would have kicked all of his kicks at goal we would have lost by less than 11 points I would imagine.

If Liam Williams hadn't been on the pitch I'm sure the margin would have been much wider. Williams cruelly keeps denying Craig Gilroy tries.

Pete330v2 wrote:

international198 wrote:I was afraid Ulster would win by 30 to 40 points. The Scarlets did well to lose by only 11 points, IMO. If Rhys Patchell would have kicked all of his kicks at goal we would have lost by less than 11 points I would imagine.

If Liam Williams hadn't been on the pitch I'm sure the margin would have been much wider. Williams cruelly keeps denying Craig Gilroy tries.

What's more impressive about that is they were on opposite sides of the pitch for most the game, Williams reading of the game was excellent (the bastardo)

glamorganalun wrote:It seemed to me everytime Steph Evans and Pratchell got tackled they were turned over, it is time to diitch Pratchell as he also weak in the tackle. I wonder why the Blues defence has improved?

No such player.

international198 wrote:Lee Williams is playing well for Carmarthen Quins. 5 tries in 3 games. Why not bring him into the Scarlets XV?

Because he makes Shane Williams look big and he is about 40! He played for the Scarlets about 5 years ago but was too small and fragile for pro rugby.

international198 wrote:I was afraid Ulster would win by 30 to 40 points. The Scarlets did well to lose by only 11 points, IMO. If Rhys Patchell would have kicked all of his kicks at goal we would have lost by less than 11 points I would imagine.

I would guess we would have lost by 6 instead if Rhys had put over the pen and conversion that he had missed.  Not sure though, but I think those extra five points would have made a change to the final score