GUINNESS PRO14: Charles Piutau hails Ulster spirit in comeback win over Munster

The win was a much needed confidence boost for Les Kiss and his team and it opened up and eight point gap over fourth placed Edinburgh in the PRO14’s Conference B

“That was a goal for our team,” said Piutau. “And although it wasn’t pretty out there we’ll look back at the season and we got points from this game, New Year’s Day we played in front of our crowd, and coming from a game we were hurting from and we got the result, we can go forward and build on this,.

“During the week we had a big emphasis on our response, if we make a mistake or if we put together some good phases, it’s how we respond to the next play and how quickly I can get a hold of myself if I’ve made a mistake and focus and do my next job.

“Having that mindset going into this game, there were a lot of moments where we could practice that and I think in that second half we did that well.

“This week it was a focus for us, every team is different but the coaches do the review and do the planning and we work together and try to execute.

“There was a big focus on trying to work with the forwards, keep them tight to lead to space for the outside backs.”

The game changed when former Munster centre Sam Arnold was red carded against his former club on 58 minutes, Ulster clinically put the opposition away but Piutau admitted it can be difficult to play against reduced numbers as Bordeaux, Scarlets and Edinburgh have all won in recent weeks in spite of having a man sent off.

“Sometimes you do think it’s a lot easier, there’s opportunities but sometimes you can push things too much and play, there were a few times there we were pushing passes and it was hurting us,” explained the All Black.

“In our breaks were able to exploit and feedback pictures of what we were seeing they were playing a lot tighter or in their scrums their flankers came out and defended at first receiver, there are a lot of things where the back field space opened up a lot more so that really helped us.”

Piutau praised the influence of Wallaby out half Christian Leali’ifano who only have three games left in an Ulster shirt before he returns to Australia to prepare for the Super Rugby season with the Brumbies.

“For myself, playing alongside him brings a lot of calmness, a lot is happening, everything’s moving at 100mph and he’s just got this aura about him and this calibre of playing the game,” added Piutau.