An Irish view from the couch of round 14 in the URC.

Sean O’Donnell

Well last weekend, following that wonderful 6 Nations campaign, the Provinces resumed their season with more of a whimper than a bang. This weekend they kicked on with a big improvement in form and 3 wins out of 4 with the loss by Munster to the Bulls at altitude in Pretoria at least as heartwarming as any of the wins.

Munster put 5 tries on the Bulls and conceding 4 in a narrow 34-31 defeat in sweltering conditions in the middle of the day, adding to the altitude problem. They were unrecognisable from the shambolic display the previous week in sea level Durban. Their ferocious approach to the breakdown knocked the home side off their stride though they got some stunning scores from breakouts. None stood up more than Tom Ahearn with his 2 finishes and great to see the contributions of the Edogbo lads. Sad to see the promising return of Calvin Nash hit a speed bump with a knock to the head. Wishing him a complete and early recovery. 

Leinster blazed the Irish trail on Friday evening at Lansdowne Road with a good but  uneven performance again unrecognisable from the previous week. They were pinned in their own 22 for much of the first quarter suffering a double whammy of a try and a sin binning before they got back on with the Scarlets suffering 2 yellows in quick succession giving Leinster a 2 man advantage for several minutes. Tries by Josh Kenny and Gary Ringrose gave them a 12-7 half time lead. Two excellent finishes by man of the match Tommy O Brien in the first 5 minutes after the restart gave Leinster a 10 point advantage. Scarlets never threw in the towel and crossed twice more but Leinster sealed the deal with Max Deegan getting on the score sheet followed by a second from Kenny, a man who must come into the Ireland conversation soon. Whether Leinster are in position to trouble the European heavyweights will cost the jury more deliberation time. 

Saturday afternoon in the western capital Connacht maintained their winning streak putting away a stubborn Ospreys who refused to lie down. A brace by no 7 Shamus Hurley Langton and one for Ulster scrum half designate Matthew Devine made up Connacht’s total. Stuart Lancaster is now bringing his expertise to the party west of the Shannon. 

Ulster had their usual stern examination at Zebre in a match sullied by the disgraceful eye gouging of Stuart McCloskey which correctly earned the perpetrator a rare straight red card although not before the referee was exercised by whether there was provocation. There wasn’t but that was totally irrelevant in relation to this intolerable offence which merits a zero tolerance approach. The ref was absolutely correct in the action he ultimately took but this player should now be handed a life ban. This is necessary to eradicate this kind of vicious and dangerous assault which runs counter to all the values of Rugby and sportsmanship yet is increasingly prevalent in our game. And please no more weasel euphemism like ” making contact with….” Call it what it is: gouging, an ugly and vicious assault. 

As for the game Ulster knocked out a hard won bonus point result. Zebre were never going to be readily put away. Ulster had to earn each of their 4 tries and Zebre kept coming back at them, even with 14. The pity is that they can play lovely Rugby often capitalising on Ulster handling errors to launch dangerous counterattacks.

Ulster tries came from new tighthead Tom McAlister, old stager Rob Herring and wings Zac Ward and man of the match Verner Koch. Final score Zebre 12 Ulster 28.

All in all things looking reasonably up for the provinces.