Centre Jude Postlethwaite felt it took Ulster 40 minutes to get the ring rustiness out of their system before eventually putting Benetton to the sword at Ravenhill.

Ulster were a point behind the Italians at the interval but five unanswered tries in the second half gave Richie Murphy’s side a 47-13 win as the province finished the weekend fourth in the United Rugby Championship table and have a game in hand over leaders Cape Town Stormers.

“I feel like we had opportunities to sort of put points on the board and just mistakes after mistakes sort of let that not happen,” said man of the match Postlethwaite.

"But I feel like in the second half we sort of went ball-focused and ended up scoring a lot more tries, and I felt like our attack was a lot more better in the second half.

placeholder image — Centre Jude Postlethwaite was the man of the match for Ulster against Benetton in Friday's United Rugby Championship success. (Photo by Arthur Allison/Pacemaker Press)

“I actually feel like the first half we could have got a bit more points but now we'll be definitely happy with that.

“I feel like it was just more of our ball focus, our ruck as well – once we got them sorted, I felt our attack in the first half was alright.

“We could have scored a lot more but… building the pressure in the second half sort of paid dividends for us.”

Ulster now turn their attention to Europe with a first ever group game in the Challenge Cup as Racing 92 come to Ravenhill on Friday.

The Parisians arrive in Belfast on the back of a 48-24 defeat and sit 11th in the Top 14.

Postlethwaite said: “It's exciting, I feel like we'll review the first half in that game especially and there's definitely stuff we need to work on, but I'm really excited for Friday night.

“It's a good place to sort of build from. It's been really, really positive, I’m really looking forward to the next few games. We have a big block of 10 games here so it's important that we start well and obviously get a bonus point win.”