Ulster Head Coach Brian McLaughlin has named his starting XV, plus replacements, ahead of Sunday’s Magners League match, against Edinburgh, at Murrayfield, kick off 4.05pm.
The backs see Jamie Smith return as full back, with Simon Danielli moving to the wing. With Danielli back in position, Nevin Spence drops to the bench. Niall O’Connor starts at out half, with Ian Humphreys beginning the Magners clash as a replacement.
In the pack, a front row re-shuffle sees Captain Rory Best start as hooker, with BJ Both as tight head prop. Andy Kryicaou is named as a replacement, while Declan Fitzpatrick is rotated to the Ravens Team ahead of their British and Irish Cup semi final against Munster A, this Saturday at Thomond Park. Dan Tuohy is called up to the second row in place of Ryan Caldwell. A fully fit Stephen Ferris will start at No6, with Willie Faloon as open side flanker.
Commenting on the Magners League fixture, Ulster Coach Brian McLaughlin said:
“We are all very positive heading to face Edinburgh. We have played them quite a few times this season; the last time at Ravenhill we gained the points. In September, when we faced them in the league, we were narrowly defeated by 3 points. We had a really strong first half, but just couldn’t sustain it, and that’s been our problem over the last number of games, doing well early on, but just unable to sustain it until the final whistle.
The players are training hard, and working well together. Everyone knows what is expected of them. Yesterday the IRFU Defence Coach Les Kiss was up doing a lot of work with us, and our attack is solid.
So it is just a matter of going out at Murrayfield on Sunday with the attitude that we can gain the victory.
We have to be mentally and physically tough and make sure we don’t give away soft, cheap and easy points,”
Team: (15-9) Jamie Smith, Andrew Trimble, Darren Cave, Ian Whitten, Simon Danielli, Niall O’Connor, Paul Marshall. (1-8) Tom Court, Rory Best (Capt), BJ Botha, Ed O’Donoghue, Dan Tuohy, Stephen Ferris, Willie Faloon, Robbie Diack. (16-22) Andy Kyricaou, Bryan Young, Ryan Caldwell, TJ Anderson, Isaac Boss, Ian Humphreys, Nevin Spence
So there you go. The biggest surprises are no Chris Henry, with Rory Best returning as Captain, and no Paddy Wallace.
I’m a bit disappointed to see Marshall start ahead of Boss and I hope it’s not due to the Management Team trying to make a point. Marshall had a good enough game last time out but in my mind he’s not in the same league as the departing Isaac, having a tendency to take on too much himself. However I can see how his sniping type of play might take a bit of pressure off O’Connor trying to make a break.
The back row of Ferris, Faloon and Diack should be interesting and hopefully the young Hinch player has enough match play under his belt to make the same impact as he did at the start of the season.
Mystified to see no Paddy as there was no word of injuries in the build up. No matter how well young Whitten played the other night he does not have Paddy’s ability to get over the gain line with the ball still available. It may just be as simple as Ulster wanting to keep some key players back for what will, most probably, be and all or nothing match against Connacht in a fortnight’s time.
It’s not the starting XV I would have picked but I suppose it’s not that far off but I do think that the fact that Kyriacou, Boss, Henry and Wallace are not starting will limit our performance. Conversely though I think that Ulster may be more relaxed than Edinburgh given that the Scots are at home and pushing for a top four finish at the expense of their great rivals Glasgow. This might help, I’m sure Ulster are wagering everything on the match against Connacht, and they might just go out and have a good crack against the Scots, who don’t cope that well with unstructured play.
Given Edinburgh’s style of play I can see it all coming down to the line outs yet again so there’s a lot of pressure resting on, an out of form, Rory Best’s shoulders and this is the crucial call. Let’s hope he finds his darts because with Best captain I can’t see him being taken off unless injured or Ulster are well out of it.
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3 Responses to “Ulster Team for Edinburgh”
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Another strange selection. O’Connor back after giving Humps jnr just one game. Boss, who going by Reddan’s awful performance the other night, will be first choice at Leinster,isn’t good enough for us. Glad to see Faloon back and I think this is potentially our best back-row line-up.
I hope they were shown a relay of Connacht v Leinster…..might show them what a bit of extra effort and guts can do.
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Yes GG this could be our best back-row and worst half-back selection.
I have given up with McLaughlin’s selections he is now on tract to have our worst season results even worse than Matt Williams perhaps the worst coach to have coached an international side in the world and that is saying something.
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Irish Independent website reported today that although Wallace was in the squad, he wasn’t 100% fit and still struggling with injury.
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