Dan McFarland hails Ulster performance

The game was played in stormy conditions with driving rain and gale force winds but a try in each half was enough to give Ulster a valuable four points, which draws them level with Leinster at the top of the United Rugby Championship table.

“When you go to Newport to play the Dragons you know they are going to come after you and when the conditions are like that you know it is going to be even more difficult,” said McFarland.

“The way that they play, the quality of the back row that they have, this was always going to be a very tough fixture and when the conditions are the way they are we needed to approach it in a certain way.

“Would it have been nice to be a little more accurate when we got into their half in the second half and been a little bit more controlled in the way that we played the game? Yes of course we would have done. We would have wanted to give ourselves more opportunities to get tries but it is what it is and 12-0 is a good result in these conditions.

“In an ideal world the conditions would have been better and it would have been easier to play with the ball, but they were horrendous and I haven’t played in conditions like that for a long time.”

McFarland said it was as equally difficult playing with the conditions as it was playing against them.

“I think it was really difficult in both halves, even playing with the wind the difficulty of passing becomes even more prevalent,” he said.

“The opposition can come off the line at you and cause you trouble.

“To come away 12-0 having been as physical as we were in defence and as disciplined as we were was really pleasing.

“We found an area of the game that we could dominate and that was the scrum and we used it to good effect to engineer positions on the field.”

The coach felt one of the key factors in the victory was not conceding penalties.

“In really bad conditions like that territory is everything, whether you are playing with our without the wind,” McFarland said.

“When you are playing into he wind you don’t want to be sat around your 40 or 30 metre line and being ill disciplined because straight away it is a kicking opportunity, and when you are playing with the wind you don’t want to release pressure.

“It was a big focus for us and I thought the lads did an excellent job.”

Nick Timoney was released for Andy Farrell’s Ireland Six Nations camp for the game in Newport and McFarland handed the backrower the skipper’s armband for the first time.

“Nick has done a really good job and brings an intensity to what he does and that was going to be crucial over here and I think that played out over here,” he said.

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