22
ULSTER
RUGBY
October is traditionally a key segment of the
rugby calendar, with an increasingly competitive
Guinness PRO12 holding station while Europe’s
rich pickings beckon.
Both competitions have been revamped,
their importance enhanced, Ulster will face
Edinburgh and Glasgow in the next eight
days, followed by a mouth-watering week with
Champions’ Cup action in Leicester and at
Kingspan Stadium against Europe’s kingpins,
Toulon.
It is a four-week period which undeniably
can set the tone for the season. It will not
necessarily derail ambitions in league and cup,
but winning is a habit which can be happily,
harmlessly addictive. It provides – to use a word
so much used at Gleneagles last weekend –
momentum, that abstract but very real surge in
belief.
Winning matches, and winning when
performing well, breeds confidence in the
squad and very notably in individual players.
Collectively that confidence grows, nurtured
by the coaches and management in a positive,
marshalled way. It has been the Ulster way, in
recent years, to build towards the autumn in a
manner which prepares a large squad to be
prepared and palpably capable for a month of
real endeavour and enterprise.
Last weekend’s defeat in Zebre was a shock
to the Ulster system – players, management
and fans – will be dwelling on the errors and
perceived injustices in Parma.
This week’s training sessions will have
addressed the deficiencies of that first-ever
loss to the improving Zebre, but they will
have concentrated more on fine-tuning the
players’ undoubted qualities, asking for them
to individually and as a group to take on
Edinburgh this evening with controlled ferocity
of purpose.
The old maxim of ‘one game at a time’ will have
been uttered many times on the pitches and in
the team rooms, and the importance of setting
a winning template for this key month will not
be lost on a squad which has an intelligence
and awareness about itself which will demand
that Kingspan Stadium sees a performance of
conviction and character against the Scottish
visitors.
There will not be any complaints or moans from
the coaching team about the unprecedented
injury count, it has assembled a pool which is
deep in talent and in ambition for itself and for
Ulster Rugby.
Nobody will be fooled by the bizarre
circumstances which saw a losing bonus
point in Italy hoist the team into third place in
the PRO12 league table: it’s about winning
matches and getting a minimum of four points,
and adding to the try-count at every sensible
opportunity.
Edinburgh arrive in Belfast on the back of a
home draw at Murrayfield against the Scarlets,
and with a wonderful win in Munster already ‘in
the bank’.
Alan Solomons returns to the stadium where he
directed operations in for three years from 2001,
but the South African knows Ulster so well that
the marvellous arena and facilities at Kingspan
have been made possible by a professional
approach on and off the field which he had
no small part in establishing during his strict,
determined stewardship as coach.
The Celtic Cup was won in his reign, ironically
on a night at Murrayfield when the heavens
opened but Ulster showed those early signs
of consistent application and self-belief. Alan’s
time in the South African international team
management set-up, his frontline coaching
roles all over the world, provides testament to
his hunger for improvement.
He’s never tried to ‘dodge’ a challenge and with
Edinburgh he believes he has a club which can
cause more than the occasional upset, that
the Scottish capital’s players can match any in
league and European competition.
Neil Doak, Jonny Bell and Allen Clarke will know
that one of the game’s sharpest intellects will
send out a Scottish side focussed on its own
targets in the PRO12, and with real belief it can
do damage in Europe.
But for the majority of fans in Kingspan this
evening the hope will be that the men in the
famous white jerseys will calmly announce that
it’s ‘business as usual’. The last six weeks has
seen most players get really testing game time,
and whatever side takes the field and whoever
sits awaiting a call from the bench, there will be
quality and confidence aplenty.
This Ulster squad has a very real bond with
its supporters, their pain is theirs, and their
success is a shared experience.
For the fans the next month is a rugby feast
to savour, but the main course immediately is
Edinburgh, the target a performance to fully
restore the batteries of self-belief – and a victory
from which to launch the real assault in league
and in Europe.
THE HUNT FOR
A BIG OCTOBER
MATCH
PREVIEW
On two fronts this month Ulster will really hope to find
the form and consistency to shape the season.
by ROD
NAWN
