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21
ULSTER
RUGBY
It’s November already, an evening start at Kingspan
Stadium, even from afar the floodlights picking the arena out
through the urban chill of an autumn now certainly arrived.
A week ago tonight’s combatants had Europe in focus,
Ulster rueing the loss at home to champions Toulon, the
Dragons reflecting on a reverse in the subsidiary Challenge
Cup by Newcastle. Important matches both, but Europe will
now stand aside while the Guinness PRO12 series continues
this weekend, which will mark the end of the opening stages
in the chase for the title.
Ulster will then take a short break until the Ospreys, who
have set the league pace so far, come to Belfast on Friday,
21 November. The Dragons will have LV Cup action to stretch
their playing resources to the full until Munster arrive at
Rodney Parade the same night.
This evening’s visitors have managed just one win in six
PRO12 outings to date, but with shrewd rugby men such as
Kingsley Jones, the Director of Rugby and Head Coach Lyn
Jones at the helm, one of the great bastions of the game
in Wales is confident that the rebuilding at the Dragons is
beginning to bear fruit.
Lee Byrne, Ian Gough, Jason Tovey, Aled Brew, Taulupe
Faletau, Richie Rees and the mercurial Andy Powell provide
a core of experience to a carefully-assembled Dragons
squad, and with a plethora of youngsters coming through,
the club believes it can put behind it the travails the game in
Wales has suffered and become a power in the land again.
The results this season have been disappointing, but the
coaches and the players would point to the Challenge Cup
win at Stade Francais two weeks ago as a real pointer to
the potential of Newport Gwent Dragons. That win in Paris
demonstrated that in most areas of the pitch the side is on
the right track, and the players will relish the chance to upset
the PRO12 formbook against Ulster this evening.
Neil Doak with Jonny Bell and Allen Clarke, will have swiftly
addressed tonight’s game as one which should produce the
points to copperfasten a top four place before the break for
the Ireland internationals. Absorbed will have been some of
the shortcomings of the display against Toulon, but it was
not a poor Ulster performance and there will be positive
lessons to take out of the game with Europe’s best.
But very clearly the Dragons will have been the focus of this
week’s preparation. The PRO12 is the staple of professional
rugby for the Irish, Scottish and Italian sides, and certainly
the most important commitment for the Welsh clubs. The
path to Europe is through the season-long marathon, that is
the league, and coaches break down the playing year to take
into account injuries, international obligations, and the oldest
of factors: form.
With those involved with Ireland the Player Management
protocols strictly limit the playing time of those such as
Tommy Bowe, Rory Best, Chris Henry, Jared Payne, Stuart
Olding, Craig Gilroy and Robbie Diack, all required by Joe
Schmidt. Those not originally listed, such as Paddy Jackson
and Darren Cave, may well still be summoned to Carton
House, so Doak will have already planned different strategies
for the league games during November.
Against the Dragons he will be confident in those available
to him, the depth in midfield means Darren Cave and the
revelation which has been Stuart McCloskey, should be
available.
It’s a cliché that it is squad depth which brings success, but
it’s undoubtedly true that during the autumn internationals
and the New Year Six Nations clubs must have more than
just ‘reserves’. They must have players able to compete at
the top level and meet the standards which will have been
set in training since everyone arrived for pre-season in July.
Franco van der Merwe, Wiehahn Herbst and Louis Ludik
have arrived at Ulster and already cemented their growing
reputations and they will be key figures not just tonight but
throughout a packed and demanding year.
So there will be no talk in the dressing room or training
ground of weakened Ulster sides, the quality of the squad is
proven and chosen so that when it changes – for whatever
reason – it does not diminish the expectations of those who
select and the huge crowds which pour into Kingspan in
support of the men in white.
Neil Doak has taken sole charge of the Head Coach reins,
his own personal ambition realised after working through the
professional ranks with Ulster as a player, a development
officer ‘growing’ the game at the real grassroots of the sport.
He moved through the coaching phases to earn a reputation
which reportedly had attracted three lucrative offers to
leave the Province last summer, but he’d always hoped the
Province, which had brought him to the brink of international
recognition under Ireland coach Murray Kidd in the late
1990s might just ‘call’.
He relies on Bell and Clarke, and on Niall Malone too, to take
on their specific duties with backs and forwards and with
high-octane analysis of team and individual performances,
but ‘Doaky’ will stand by his conclusions on selection and
on performances, and he is ‘weathered’ enough to know
that there will be some good times and some less welcome
times.
He fully buys into the aspiration of Ulster becoming a world-
class rugby organisation, and he’s been on the journey
which has provided convincing evidence that the players,
staff and facilities are reaching out for that near horizon.
He knows too that results are king in professional sport,
and while concentrating hard on the targeted defeat of the
Dragons this evening he’ll be fashioning firm ideas about the
approach to next month’s resumption in the Champions Cup,
and the busy, hectic month which is December.
On this Halloween weekend he won’t want any frights, but
he won’t mind if his team’s performance proves a scary
experience for the Welsh visitors – and provides fans with
another big rugby occasion under the Kingspan Stadium
lights.
PLOTTING A HALLOWEEN SCARE
FOR THE DRAGONS
Clocks have been duly corrected, an hour gained apparently, but time marches
on, never more speedily than for players, coaches and fans of rugby.
by ROD
NAWN
