Positives & Negatives: Ulster V Cardif

[Lurgan Lad]

back row of Molitika, Rush and Williams was made to look very average.

Would that be because they are poor to average anyway?

All obviously getting up in years, wouldn't call them average though. Williams unfortunate not to go to the WC, Rush and Molitika both brutes of men.

[Bring Humph On!!]

Don't really wish to single out any individual's as I thought it was a very good team performance with everyone doing their job. Especially defensively. Cardiff have won with bonus points the last 2 weeks and we didn't give them a sniff. We looked comfortable throughout. Great work by our defense.

Only negatives for me are the injuries to Cave and Humph and the failure of the ref/touch judges to take any action against Lualala or Molitika for their late hits on Humph. Its not a massive concern at this early stage in the season but once again we left 2 or 3 trys out on the pitch through either lack of composure or skills letting us down. But maybe I'm being too picky..

[Shem]

And to cap it all of- Xavier Rush was sin binned, had a howler, seen the quality and versatility that we have and was on the losing side without a bp...I ask you ladies and gentlemen, does utter much sweeter?

[againstthehead]

I was gutted to miss out on Rush - however, he's half the player he once was. Still not 100% convinced by P3 but he gives 110% week in, week out so fair does.

[Kingketch]

Excellent result - top of the table

Thought James Jones had a reasonable game. Missed a few things but no ref is perfect. On the whole pretty good.

[OneMore]

Don't want to rain on the parade or anything here lads, but if that's our best performance this season, we're in big trouble.

Cardiff were terribly disappointing, they offered nothing in attack, Ulster are still missing tackles and dropping balls. I will say that I thought the ref made a few big mistakes, and this probably contributed to our lack of momentum.

+ Payne looks excellent
+ Gilroy had a great game
+ The back row played well
+ There's still more to come from this team - there'd need to be.

- The plonkers standing behind me who criticised Humphreys the whole way through the game. "O no, here we go again." - What do you want them to do? It's not like Pienaar is there to take over kicking duties. Complete idiots.
- Too many mistakes.
- We could seriously do with getting Pienaar back, Marshall was back to his bad old worst last night.

[Rooster]

Caves trys in the video thread, anyone who wants a full match YouTube I can provide link

[Snipe Watson]

Don't want to rain on the parade or anything here lads, but if that's our best performance this season, we're in big trouble.

Cardiff were terribly disappointing, they offered nothing in attack, Ulster are still missing tackles and dropping balls. I will say that I thought the ref made a few big mistakes, and this probably contributed to our lack of momentum.

+ Payne looks excellent
+ Gilroy had a great game
+ The back row played well
+ There's still more to come from this team - there'd need to be.

- The plonkers standing behind me who criticised Humphreys the whole way through the game. "O no, here we go again." - What do you want them to do? It's not like Pienaar is there to take over kicking duties. Complete idiots.
- Too many mistakes.
- We could seriously do with getting Pienaar back, Marshall was back to his bad old worst last night.

I would add Cronin,Tuohy and Dizzy to that list.

P3 was quieter than usual.

[rumncoke]

At the 25 min mark I was a little worried looking at only 3 points on the board with a second half to come into the wind. The first try was crucial coming from a fine break from Gilroy and support from Cave the second was a beautiful text book try -- make the break and give the ball to a player in space.
I have been a big supporter of the Spence / Cave partnership in the centre when Cave went off the Whitten/ Spence partnership was about par for last year huff and puff and a big let down.
Watched the match again on IPlayer and a bit happier when Cave reported his withdrawal was precautionary but IH looked seriously distressed .
Gilroy got MOTM but there were several contenders Tuohy Cave Henry Payne and P3 could all have qualified .

Very much impressed by Payne who looks like a player who will help and encourage the players round him a much needed on field influence with so many young players in the backline squad.

[darkside lightside]

I thought Spence and Cave looked great, so much for Spence not being able to distribute, and Cave certainly knows his way to the try line.. Payne looked good, a nice direct runner. I thought Marshall was very good actually, that one bad kick apart - Porter on the other hand looked poor when he came on. Decent result all told..

[gannonman]

I agree with baggy. Henry was the best player on the pitch in my opinion.

[Ardglass2]

Spence is certainly doing a good job of putting the 'he cant pass' theorists in their place.

[againstthehead]

Tuohy has been outstanding this season so far. And I though Stevenson was sound last night too - the pack just seem that bit more aggressive. Nice to see Diack start a game too.

[lovesthehardground]

+s - Payne looks a beauty. His outside break in the first half was mesmeric. Looks to have extra time on the ball. Was communicating with the other players from the off. Looks to be a good organiser.
Spence had great runs and put in some super tackles.
Cave gets two tries
Gilroy is great to watch. Get the ball to him more
Hump looked to be getting back to his best
Henry was immense with P3 & Diack working well together.
Tuohy = brilliant. Stevenson looks like he adds a bit of nastiness to the pack but unlike Caldwell last year doesn't give away penalties.
Cronin - probably the best game I've seen him play

-s - injuries to two key players
size of the crowd again. Whats wrong with people, why aren't they coming to Ravenhill??
And specially for Baggy - THE LACK OF A BONUS POINT AGAIN

[rumncoke]

I think the World Cup might be having a negative effect with regards the crowd .The Ulster squad are minus 7 players at the moment and some may view the games like going to Western and there's no John Wayne and the weather forecast last night was not good and the match was on the telly ,like wise the Ireland match this morning some have a limited capacity .

Regarding Porter with the exit of IH-- my view was that Porter had been instructed to close the game down and feed the forwards keep the game down in the Cardiff end keep possession if those were his instructions then he carried them out so any assessment of his ability should take the instructions into account.