Ulster sink Stormers with home success

​Ulster moved up to third in the United Rugby Championship with a comprehensive 35-5 bonus point victory over the Stormers at Kingspan Stadium.
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Ulster made light of missing their five Ireland players to outscore the defending champions by five tries to one to go into the Six Nations break with back-to-back wins.

The South African’s had made 10 changes from the side that beat Clermont in the Champions Cup last week.

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Ulster had two tries disallowed in the opening four minutes, firstly from a line out maul that resulted in the forwards driving for the line.

Ulster head coach Dan McFarlandUlster head coach Dan McFarland
Ulster head coach Dan McFarland

Hooker Tom Stewart was adjudged to have knocked the ball on as he shipped it to Nathan Doak and the scrum half’s touchdown was ruled out.

However, Ulster had a penalty advantage and they kicked to the corner again, this time from the maul Stewart darted over but his effort was chalked off for crossing in the build up.

Ulster finally broke the deadlock on 13 minutes. From a scrum in midfield, Stewart Moore made a searing line break, Alan O’Connor and Harry Sheridan carried close to the line before Doak sniped over from close range and converted his own try.

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Ben Moxham scored his first try in Ulster colours on 24 minutes after the forwards punched holes in the Stormers defence to create space and the ball was spun wide for the winger to coast over with Doak converting.

Ulster got their third try in first half injury time. They were awarded a penalty close to the Stormers line, Stewart opted for the tap and go but was stopped short. Flanker Nick Timoney then picked up and barged over with Doak’s conversion extending Ulster’s lead to 21-0 at the interval.

Stormers lock Ben-Jason Dixon was sin binned on 44 minutes and Ulster kicked the penalty to touch but couldn’t profit after an overthrow at the line out.

Ulster wrapped the bonus point up two minutes later when centre James Hume cut open the visitors defence and had prop Jeff Toomaga-Allen on his shoulder. The Samoan went over for his first try in the white shirt with Doak adding the extras.

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Full back Mike Lowry was next to get on the score sheet, crossing on 55 minutes.

Moxham made the initial break, passed inside to Duane Vermeulen before the South African gave it back to the winger, who carried into the 22 before offloading to Lowry to go under the posts untouched. John Cooney added the conversion.

With a raft of changes from both sides, the game petered out and the majority of the second half was played between the 22’s

The Stormers got a late consolation try on 77 minutes when replacement backrow Andre Hugo-Venter powered over from a driving maul on an evening to forget for the visitors, who have lost three of their last four on the road.

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ULSTER: M Lowry, R Lyttle, J Hume, S Moore, B Moxham, B Burns, N Doak,

E O’Sullivan, T Stewart, J Toomaga Allen; A O’Connor (capt), S Carter; H Sheridan, N Timoney, D Vermeulen,

Replacements: J Andrew, R Sutherland, A Warwick, K Treadwell, J Murphy, J Cooney, I Madigan, E McIlroy