Ulster Rugby vs Zebra

The hosts proved somewhat wasteful with the resulting lineout, and the two scrum- halves were soon involved in another charge-down incident, Cooney this time blocking Chudley’s kick deep in the Ulster half and showing great pace to collect his own punt forward and outstrip his chasers to the line for the try, and converted his own score. A long-distance penalty from Freddie Burns got Bath on the scoreboard on 25 minutes, and as the Ulster penalty count ramped up to five moments later, the full- back added a second from 25 metres to presented Cooney with a simple penalty in front of the posts – which the scrum-half, who had yet to put a foot wrong in the game, screwed wide. As play suddenly opened up just before the hour mark, the second Ulster score came out of nowhere, Addison kicking a loose ball into a huge gap on the Bath left flank, and Lyttle collecting unchallenged to dot down, Cooney again adding the extras. Bath were soon right back in it, however, with youngster Gabriel Hamer-Webb – only on the field for a matter of seconds – picking up on the left wing from Zach Mercer’s pass and outfoxing Addison with deft footwork to mark his European debut with a superb try. Burns’s conversion made it a one-point game once again, until the 66th minute when a high tackle from Alan O’Connor saw Priestland’s penalty nudge his side in front for the first time in the encounter. Unflustered, Ulster took their time, eventually grinding out a penalty in the 71st minute, with which Cooney made no mistake with this time. Chasing the game once more, Bath peppered the Ulster line with searching kicks, but Stockdale, Cooney and then Addison twice all collected flawlessly as the clock ran on. reduce the deficit to a single point. A no-arms tackle by Charlie Ewels

A Bath infringement at scrum-time with three minutes to play bought Ulster valuable metres and seconds, but their game of keep-ball fell apart with 90 seconds remaining, leaving the travelling fans’ hearts in their mouths until an inspired sliding interception by Stockdale saved the day, as Mercer sought Rokoduguni metres from the line for a nailed-on try. Ulster will now look to build on their excellent start when they welcome Clermont Auvergne to the Kingspan Stadium in Round 2.

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