Positives & Negatives Cardiff V Ulster

[againstthehead]

well, I only saw the 2nd half so perhaps a tad biassed with regards to the positives lol.....

Positives
- Gilroy: what a wee cracker. 2nd try was a beauty
- Faloon: made a real impact with his work on the floor and support play. Must be a contender to start at 7.
- Lineout was outstanding in the last half hour - looked crap before that but the rolling maul was a sight for sore eyes - MORE MORE MORE!!!
- scrum looked tasty with the wrecking ball back in the front row
- marshall looked feisty and quick as lightening.
- humph - a game changer.
- a win away from home
- a win in wales
- a BP win
- a win to take us back to the top 4
- an end to our losing streak
- oh and we played the game out really well when we took the lead. Defended really well and kicked for territory. super super effort.

negatives
- probably the whole of the 1st half but didn;t see it...
- injuries (Mueller, diack and wallace?)

[Tom]

Have to add D'Arcy to that. He looks like the real deal. Gilroy was awesome, put Trimble in the back 3 with them and everyone will be scared.

The refereeing officials were shocking, we deserved alot more decisions in the first 50

[Jackie Brown]

How D;Arcy got that yellow card I dunno, I suppose that's what happens when the touch judges aren't neutral.

[againstthehead]

what happened?

[Jackie Brown]

Went for the intercept, spilt it forward and was judged to have deliberately batted the ball to the ground. Nonsense in real time, nonsense in slow mo, the only thing the TJ called.

Aaron has stuck it on YouTube already.

[Cornerfleg]

He went for the ball with two hands ... absolutely ridiculous touch judge call ...

[Lurgan Lad]

Positives
Defence. Not sure whether it was down to Cardiff's lack of cutting edge, but the Blue definitely had the lion's share of the possession and in the main struggled to even gain ground.
Attack. We finally have cutting edge both in the forwards and backs. Loved having the rolling maul as a weapon, we have a big pack and need to use it more often to gain ground and tie in the opposition's forwards. Backs finally looking incisive and threatening.
Gameplan/Strategy. Not sure what has changed, is it execution or did we finally have a gameplan? Mauls were great, Humph clearances had great distance, when Darcy got the ball he was always threatening, our umbrella defence worked well, clearout and getting the ball away from the rucks was quick and accurate.
Scrum. Really dominated them apart from the few free kicks we gave away in the first 20 minutes for early engagement.

In terms of individuals without a doubt there were quite a few had great games. Loved the whole of our backline, Marshall played great getting the ball away quickly and accurately and posing a threat himself, IH's kicking and passing were both great apart from for the posts, Whitten a bit quiet, Spence played quite well and in our back three Gilroy and Darcy both are great threats with ball in hand. In the forwards Faloon was great when he came on, Henry played well, Tuohy and Barker real workhorses.

Negatives.
Lineout faltered from time to time, needs to improve.
Injuries.
Ref, shouted at the TV quite a few times.
Not convinced Wannenberg should be in our best back row now, probably Ferris, Diack and Faloon/Henry.

All in all the most pleasing thing to me wasn't any individual but the sense that as a team we knew what we wanted to do and did it well. Playing with ball in hand we finally looked threatening and quite often did the right thing.

[Cornerfleg]

Who got clocked right at the end????? As ususal Gusher must have been watching though binoculars into Edna's kitchen window across the street as he hadn't a clue who was on or off.

[bangorboy]

Positives

Was it just me or did iHumph seem to make some really solid tackles???
Marshall... some lovely runs set up 2 tries
Faloon - great to see him get some points
Gilroy - more please
D'Arcy - should be our starting 15 from here in
Mauls - at last

Negatives

Injuries - glad to see Muller walking off, had me worried
Ref - D'Arcy should never have been off
First 20 minutes was messy, messy, messy
Lineouts had me shouting at tv, went to pot for a while when JM came off
Trimble - been a long time since he has got me excited and his handling overall recently has been s***


All in all, an amazing match and great to see young players coming through - I just hope when AIs are over we dont just go back to same old, same old and USE the talent we have. WF perfect example - a couple of weeks on bench for 3n's might not be a bad thing.

[Rooster]

what happened?

Video of it on the youtube page.

[againstthehead]

what happened?

Video of it on the youtube page.

shocking decision. not often the linesmen intervene in the magners but when they do...

[StandUlstermen]

Have to say Faloon was excellent but Chris Henry made 2 or 3 turnovers as well and was very good. Wannenburg i thought was good as well. We totally got the better of the backrow battle. Gilroy looks to be a cracker. Has an amazing step. Ulster are a team that really needs confidence to play well and the great thing is that this will have done wonders going into the Treviso and Dragons game.

[browner]

Pos....Bonus point win and Gilroy.

Neg...failed to make a post with this feckin Blackberry

[mikerob]

Dr Dave was interviewed by S4C during the game. Said that Muller jarred his neck in a collision but it wasn't serious.

[Rooster]

Pos....Bonus point win and Gilroy.

Neg...failed to make a post with this feckin Blackberry

Not easy to see what you are at browner, need thicker specs