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URC 24/25 Season Ulster V Munster Friday 20th Dec 7:35 Kick-off [Build-up / Match Thread] PS1&TG4

Jump_In_Jack

URC 24/25 Season Ulster V Munster Friday 20th Dec 7:35 Kick-off [Build-up / Match Thread]
Live on Premier Sports 1, TG4 and BBC Sounds - Radio Ulster.

This is the only URC match today, so there should be a fair amount of interest.
The URC Season is nearing the mid-way mark, Week 8 of 18, so this fixture will be a chance for either team to steer a course back up to the top half of the table.
Ulster currently on 17 points lie in 10th position, Munster currently on 16 points lie in 11th position.
The table is currently quite condensed barring a few at the top 3 or so; to put that into context, a five-point win could put either team into the top 4 tonight. (Of course as the first match of the weekend, the other fixtures of the round are likely to alter that in due course).
Both squads are under pressure with injuries, and Munster are without Tadhg Beirne in line with IRFU player management guidelines.

Ulster: Michael Lowry (112), Werner Kok (9), Jude Postlethwaite (19), Stuart McCloskey (195), Zac Ward (1), Aidan Morgan (9), John Cooney (146), Andrew Warwick (203), Rob Herring (243), Tom O’Toole (114), Alan O’Connor (C) (202), Kieran Treadwell (166), James McNabney (8), Marcus Rea (53), David McCann (54).

Replacements: John Andrew, Eric O’Sullivan, Scott Wilson, Harry Sheridan, Matty Rea, Dave Shanahan, Jack Murphy, Rory Telfer.

Munster: Mike Haley; Calvin Nash, Tom Farrell, Alex Nankivell, Shane Daly; Jack Crowley, Paddy Patterson; John Ryan, Niall Scannell, Stephen Archer; Tom Ahern, Fineen Wycherley; Jack O’Donoghue (C), John Hodnett, Gavin Coombes.

Replacements: Eoghan Clarke, Dave Kilcoyne, Oli Jager, Evan O’Connell, Alex Kendellen, Ethan Coughlan, Rory Scannell, Brian Gleeson.

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KaneToad

Jack Murphy looked good during his few minutes. Hopefully another one who can push for a green 10 shirt, at some stage.

aloooof

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122978421#Comment_122978421

I reckon tackle counts and metres made across the team are gonna be huge.

lawrencesummers

They wanted him to look at the hit by Nash from the kickoff.

which would have been reasonable if he had looked at the hit on scannell that led to ulster turnover / penalty field position and try. But he didn’t.

KaneToad

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122978405#Comment_122978405

Team is bang out of form. They're all playing beneath themselves. Hard for the 10 to drag them up. Snatched at a couple of kicks off the tee but nothing too outrageous.

leakyboots

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122978405#Comment_122978405

I dunno, watch it back. His mistakes were very obvious like missing touch and off the tee but he ran some lovely attacking plays that broke down immediately after with a typical stupid error. 7/10 at worst for me

ionadnapóca

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122978437#Comment_122978437

why are all the Irish outhalves struggling to find touch these days?

Maybe trying to replicate the distance Prendergast is getting on his spirals?

awec

dunno how you can really judge Crowley on a game like there were Munster spent most of the time just defending.

a back scored a try every time Munster had the ball in the second half which I guess you could say speaks well for Crowley in general.

lawrencesummers

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122978424#Comment_122978424

Came of age?

FFS he’s been playing like that for months now.

leakyboots

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122978481#Comment_122978481

Just caught a replay of the winning try and he'd a lovely pass out the back up to the tacklers. He did that plenty throughout the game. We hardly had the ball like you said.

I'd be more annoyed with his placekicking to be honest than anything else, he can do better even if some of the kicks were off to the side.

leakyboots

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122978488#Comment_122978488

No idea why he hasn't been looked at, was he injured for some international windows maybe?

phog

Our defence won that game for us and yet we get a BP away from home.

Tis gas that guys can watch a match and only post negative stuff about players while ignoring what was really good play at times. They remind me of George Hook and Eddie O'Sullivan.

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122978523#Comment_122978523

Both teams were awful. There is very little positive to take from that game.

Munster won't and shouldn't care. 5 points away from home is a huge result. But ulster were injury riddled and down a man for 50 min. And had zero go forward. Munster, to their credit, when they could string passes together looked dangerous in the second half. But the error rate was atrocious.

lawrencesummers

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122978564#Comment_122978564

I disagree.

A lot of positive defensively for Munster to take from it.

Players like Patterson, Ahern, killer, O’Connell need game time and got it tonight,

A BP win away without any pack leaders, a third and 4th choice SH and no backup 10 is not to be sniffed at.

surprised Burns wasnt involved tonight.

The form of Gleeson, hodnett and Klendennen along with the return of Ahern for me has jack odonoghues days numbered as a starter. Think I would prefer to see hodnett or Alex play 6 instead of JOD. And if O’Connell gets to the level needed it frees Ahern to play 6 as well. With Beirne and POM available for Games I think jack misses out.

phog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122978564#Comment_122978564

I never said otherwise, my post was mote a comment on how a few posters can only comment negatively about some players.

Fir example, all 4 of Munster's tries showed some nice attacking rugby. But the same posters couldn't comment on any part of the plays that led to those tries. That in itself tells you more about the posters than the players they're slamming.

Homesick Alien

Positives for Munster were the ability to defend 20 phases time after time and then to be clinical with field position. Obviously we were a man up for 40 mins which makes breaking from deep easier.

But discipline was very poor and another couple of injuries to key players potentially. Big drop off from Casey to the other 9s.

phog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122978614#Comment_122978614

Tom Farrell scored a hat trick for us tonight, surely that's a positive?

We get a BP win away from home, another huge positive

I agree our ability to give easy outs or easy access to our 22 from penalties is frustrating. Some basic errors like going between the catcher and the opposition in a lineout is a coach killer

Jump_In_Jack

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122978488#Comment_122978488

It’s fair to say this has been Farrell’s biggest performance so far. Been a fan of his for a while, just hope he can help us push on now. Class player!

phog

Great caption by The Examiner

Podge_irl

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122978588#Comment_122978588

It's one of those things that is hard to judge. I thought ulster lacked any aggression, incision or heft in attack and weee incredibly easy to defend. But it's also possible that munster made it look that way and their defence was solid.

The result is a monumental positive and I'll not argue otherwise. But it was a game between two poor teams.

mun1

Travelling to Belfast missing 17 squad players like Loughman, Klyne, Edogbo, Beirne, POM, Casey, Murray, losing nanks after 30 mins, only having 30% possession , making 260 tackles (34 for Coombes), but ending up with 5 match points isn’t a bad nights work.

It was a dreadful performance , but that can wait until tomorrow

aloooof

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122978453#Comment_122978453

Agreed tbh. His place kicking was poor, but some of his kicking out of hand in phase play was very good; he had at least 2 to Hodnett and Farrell. I thought in general he passed, carried and tackled well, tbh.

phog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122978754#Comment_122978754

He played really well, some of his kicking in play was top notch.

aloooof

Some of the provisional stats come out of the game with regards Munster's tackle counts are nuts.

phog

Our defence won the game, especially in the first half, we improved our attack in the second half and outscored them 17-12 but we had tons of defending to do, mainly because of we gifting them penalties and easy access to our 5m line

FtD v2

The defence was okay but don’t oversell it - Munster still conceded three tries to a team without a single power carrier in their pack. They seriously lived on the edge too and were blessed that Whitehouse didn’t give them another yellow (Coughlan should have had one), and I think Ulster had penalty advantage when McNabney scored and were on a team warning so that could have been one too.

The bigger question is why they could only manage c. 30% possession against a team that was equally missing at least their three best forwards (Henderson, Izuchukwu, Timoney), that had a man sent off after 30 mins and that picked up plenty of injuries throughout (including to their most effective carrier, McCloskey).

leakyboots

They kept dropping or losing the ball

Cookiemunster

The defence is much improved on earlier in the season, as is the scrum, but the line out is still a shambles.

Our pen count in multiple games now is ridiculous. 16 conceded last night to add to 17 in Castres. It's no surprise that with that kind of discipline and a shambles of a line out Ulster had so much possession and territory, even with 14 players.

I though Crowley had a decent enough game outside of the kicking from the tee. You don't score 4 tries from outside the 22 if your 10 is as bad as some are making out. Especially with only 30% possession meaning he didn't see much of the ball.

Still though I have to agree with the posters who said it was two poor teams. I'm not looking forward to next Friday night.

aloooof

The irony is we’d likely have had more possession if we hadn’t been so clinical in attack.

phog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122979165#Comment_122979165

This is the thing, once we managed to hold on to the ball, we showed we can score, early in the game we kicked a few penalties to touch but managed to lose our lineout, I think we got turned over in the ruck a few times & Farrell's penalty gave them another easy out but once we ran at them with quick ball we cut through them.

The opposite can be said for Ulster, I'd say, you could count on one hand the amount of times they carried the ball from their half into our 22. Their main point of entry to our 22/5m zone was from kicking to touch.

I also felt Ben (while he could have given us a YC for repeated pens) was very generous at times to Ulster, we probably should have won a few penalties at ruck time but he waved one play. In one case he allowed Kok do exactly what he penalised Farrell for minutes earlier.

FtD v2

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/122979165#Comment_122979165

Yeah, this is fair, and I had the same thought last night. But there is still a crazy amount of basic errors, poor set piece, awful discipline and ineffective play.

They showed super heart in defence and showed a nice cutting edge when it mattered, but they’re way below where they need to be or where they’re capable of being.