Ulster v Benetton Friday Oct 8 7:35pm KO

[Dave]

Any other clubs had four in a week?

Asking for a journo.

[allezlesverres]

Did anyone have a guess at a selection for this one? I'll have a go: EOS, Herring, Marty, AOC (c), Carter, Jones, Reidy, Timoney, Doak, BB, Mcilroy, Moore, Hume, Gilroy, Addison?

There will be a few tough calls in there. I'm not a big fan of Jones but Rea was poor last week. He was very sluggish around the park and I thought that was a big reason we weren't securing decent ball at the breakdown. We'd all like McCann to get some more minutes but he wasn't great last week either (I don't think he was poor but he was pretty anonymous). You could bench him and hope that Reidy or Timoney is fit to do 80 and they could shift about to accommodate him at 8. Timoney has continued his excellent run of form and is one of the first names on the sheet for me.

With Doak on the field as a place kicker you could start Lowry at 10, but i think i'd still have him as a bench option for impact and flexibility (he could go to 15 and put Addison at 13 if he had to). I think BB should start for some mature territorial kicking and high percentage place kicking, then i'd have Lowry on at 50 mins or so to liven things up.

Whatever the selection I think it will be our toughest game of the season yet. On the plus side, there should be a large crowd which will mean a good atmosphere if nothing else.

[Neill_M]

Did anyone have a guess at a selection for this one? I'll have a go: EOS, Herring, Marty, AOC (c), Carter, Jones, Reidy, Timoney, Doak, BB, Mcilroy, Moore, Hume, Gilroy, Addison?

There will be a few tough calls in there. I'm not a big fan of Jones but Rea was poor last week. He was very sluggish around the park and I thought that was a big reason we weren't securing decent ball at the breakdown. We'd all like McCann to get some more minutes but he wasn't great last week either (I don't think he was poor but he was pretty anonymous). You could bench him and hope that Reidy or Timoney is fit to do 80 and they could shift about to accommodate him at 8. Timoney has continued his excellent run of form and is one of the first names on the sheet for me.

With Doak on the field as a place kicker you could start Lowry at 10, but i think i'd still have him as a bench option for impact and flexibility (he could go to 15 and put Addison at 13 if he had to). I think BB should start for some mature territorial kicking and high percentage place kicking, then i'd have Lowry on at 50 mins or so to liven things up.

Whatever the selection I think it will be our toughest game of the season yet. On the plus side, there should be a large crowd which will mean a good atmosphere if nothing else.

Be up in 30 minutes

[justinr73]

I didn’t think the Italians were great against Edinburgh although they certainly fought to the end. Probably picked up a few injuries in the celebrations.

[Neill_M]

Ulster team to play Benetton Rugby, United Rugby Championship Round 3, Friday 8 October at Kingspan Stadium, 7.35pm kick-off:

(15-9) Will Addison, Craig Gilroy, James Hume, Stewart Moore, Ethan McIlroy, Billy Burns, Nathan Doak;

(1-8) Andrew Warwick, Rob Herring, Tom O’Toole, Alan O’Connor, Sam Carter (Capt.), Matty Rea, Nick Timoney, David McCann.

Replacements: Brad Roberts, Callum Reid, Ross Kane, Mick Kearney, Sean Reidy, David Shanahan, Mike Lowry, Ben Moxham.

Players not considered due to injury or unavailability:

Jack McGrath, Marty Moore, Eric O’Sullivan, Iain Henderson, Kieran Treadwell, Cormac Izuchukwu, Dave O’Connor, Jordi Murphy, John Cooney, Stuart McCloskey, Luke Marshall, Rob Baloucoune, Jacob Stockdale, Rob Lyttle.

[Neill_M]

Benetton Rugby:

15 Rhyno Smith, 14 Ratuva Tavuyara, 13 Marco Zanon, 12 Tommaso Benvenuti, 11 Luca Sperandio, 10 Leonardo Marin, 9 Callum Braley, 8 Braam Steyn, 7 Michele Lamaro (c), 6 Giovanni Pettinelli, 5 Federico Ruzza, 4 Irné Herbst, 3 Ivan Nemer, 2 Corniel Els, 1 Federico Zani

16 Tomas Baravalle, 17 Cherif Traoré, 18 Tiziano Pasquali, 19 Marco Lazzaroni, 20 Sebastian Negri, 21 Lorenzo Cannone, 22 Luca Petrozzi, 23 Luca Morisi.

[justinr73]

Decent team unavailable……

Rea and McCann will need to step it up this week.

[germcevoy]

Jesus Christ that injury list. Hopefully some back and firing for Connacht and the rest for Europe.

[justinr73]

At first glance, their 9 and 10 from last week have dropped out entirely, as has Monty Ioane.

[justinr73]

The ref is AJ Jacobs who did the game at Newport last week.

Saw the second half and quite liked him, although that could have been because he pinged Leinster a few times (on the rare occasions they didn’t knock it on).

[Bart S]

Decent team unavailable……

Rea and McCann will need to step it up this week.

Agree although McCann is still at an early stage of his development and considered huge potential so happy to see him get another go.

Hopefully Rea will finally step up....after over 60 caps

[Big-al]

Players need a run of games as well. Starting once a month is no good to anyone. Some player we know simply haven’t the talent but those that do obviously need the chance

[jean valjean]

Personally I would only want to see one of rea or mccann in the back row at any one time but until duane and jordi are available that may not be possible. It was the age old problem of ulster having to put out weak teams to save the front liners but resulted in nothing being learned by the inexperienced players. Our SID should allow us to play the youngsters in decent teams but the injury list is crippling at the minute.

[Neill_M]

The ref is AJ Jacobs who did the game at Newport last week.

Saw the second half and quite liked him, although that could have been because he pinged Leinster a few times (on the rare occasions they didn’t knock it on).

The bar on the entertainment front has been set low then by that classic at Dave Parade.

[Dave]

Marty and EOS injured in training?