Ulster see off Leinster to close gap at top

Dan McFarland’s side won the top of the table clash 18-13 at Kingspan Stadium to close the gap to a single point.

First-half tries from Sam Carter and Michael Lowry plus eight points from the boot of Nathan Doak put Ulster in the ascendency, but the victory was sealed by a resolute second-half performance which limited the defending champions to a single penalty as the wind and rain intensified.

It was the first time Ulster had done the double over Leinster since 2013, and McFarland thinks it is a huge psychological hurdle cleared.

“Winning in Dublin was the big one for us and we played well - we didn’t play very well this time but ground out the win and the lads should take a lot of confidence from that, and be proud of the achievement,” said McFarland.

“Since 2012-13, only one team has beaten them both times in the league and that was the Dragons in 2014-15 so that says how difficult it is.”

After last month’s 12-0 win at the Dragons in stormy conditions and the win over Leinster, the head coach feels Ulster have added the trait of winning ugly to their game.

“It certainly wasn’t pretty, and it wasn’t a game we played particularly well in,” he admitted.

“But to stay in the game like we did and score nice tries and then put in the defensive effort in the second half when other areas of our game, which normally function really well weren’t functioning, was testament to the amount of work that the lads put in and they ground out the victory.

“In the first half we lacked a bit of energy and we didn’t do very well in the aerial game, and they kicked the leather off the ball. And it was a good tactic as they were winning the ball back.

“They came with side missing a lot of players and we’re missing a lot of players, but they worked really hard and played a really good game.”

Ulster were boosted by having Michael Lowry, Rob Baloucoune and Nick Timoney released from Ireland camp to face Leinster with all three contributing massively to the victory.

McFarland praised their professionalism after missing out on the trip to Twickenham.

“They’re obviously disappointed, but I’ve seen it over the last few years and when I was in Scotland, the guys coming back from international camps are just desperate to play,” he said.

“Mike coming back, Rob coming back, Nick coming back, they’re desperate to play and I’m sure it’s the same at all the over provinces.”

Ulster have the weekend off before heading to South Africa for games against the Stormers and the Bulls.

McFarland added: “We’ll look forward to that, out in Cape Town and Pretoria we’ll get good training and work very hard and prep for those games really well.

“They’ll be very physical games and I think we’re down to five games left, and we’ve got to keep churning out points if we want to finish in the top two.

“We know how difficult it is to win out there, but we’ll give it a good shot.”

Carter got the game’s first try, rumbling over from close range on eight minutes with Doak converting.

Ross Byrne landed a penalty for the visitors on 13 minutes and added the conversion to Max Deegan’s try 15 minutes later.

Doak added a penalty before Lowry finished off a slick Ulster handling move for an unconverted try on 35 minutes.

Doak’s penalty with the last kick of the first half gave Ulster a 18-10 lead at the interval.

Byrne’s penalty two minutes after the restart proved to be the only score of the second half.

Ulster: M Lowry, R Baloucoune, S Moore, S McCloskey, C Gilroy; B Burns, N Doak, A Warwick, J Andrew, M Moore, A O’Connor (capt), S Carter, M Rea, N Timoney, D Vermeulen.

Replacements: T Stewart for Andrew 37 mins, E O’Sullivan for Warwick 47 mins, G Milasinovich for M Moore 79 mins, M Kearney for Carter 47 mins, J Murphy for Rea 54 mins, J Cooney for Doak 47 mins, I Madigan, B Moxham for Vermeulen 66 mins.