Dragons Vs. Ulster

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Venue: Rodney Parade, Newport
Date: Sunday, 8 March
Kick-off: 17:15

Referee: Dudley Phillips (IRFU)
Assistant Referees: Ben Whitehouse, Martyn Lewis (both WRU)
Citing Commissioner: Gwyn Bowden (WRU)
TMO: Derek Bevan (WRU)


Newport Gwent Dragons: Geraint Rhys Jones; Tom Prydie, Jack Dixon, Ashley Smith, Hallam Amos, Dorian Jones, Jonathan Evans; Boris Stankovich, T. Rhys Thomas (c), Brok Harris, Andrew Coombs, Cory Hill, James Thomas, James Benjamin, Nick Crosswell.
Replacements: Rhys Buckley, Phil Price, Lloyd Fairbrother, Matthew Screech, Scott Matthews, Luc Jones, Carl Meyer, Ashton Hewitt.

Ulster: L Ludik; C Gilroy, D Cave (capt), M Stanley, M Allen, I Humphreys, R Pienaar; C Black, R Herring, W Herbst, D Tuohy, F Van der Merwe, I Henderson, C Ross, N Williams.
Replacements: J Andrew, A Warwick, B Ross, L Stevenson, R Diack, P Marshall, S Arnold, R Scholes.

Pridie a bit of donkey dropping the ball while winning the kicking game

This is awful, worse than the defeat to Zebre, utter bilge by Ulster

Disgraceful.

That was great, we needed that. Two decent 9s we have and they're both off next year...

Well done dragons keeping the pressure up

glamorganalun wrote:Pridie a bit of donkey dropping the ball while winning the kicking game

If I'm honest, he has been quite inconsistent this season after showing a lot of promise earlier in his career.

Dragons still not getting it away in the scrum

Great steal from Coombs, even better clearance from scrumhalf.

Well done Coombes great take I wish team Wales take note

Again pathetic midfield defense from Dragons.

Good try for Ulster a bit too easy

Turning out to be a good game

That handoff from Amos

Go for the bonus!

Brilliant, drop an easy kick and then kick straight down the throat of their back three. Well done Ulster.

alun you're always failing to admit that Amos is one of the best attacking wingers in Wales. He makes things happen, which is more than the current Wales wingers can do.

Dragon 15 my Motm

What a try by the Amos!

Ulster are a pathetic shambles of a team. Disgusted at them.

Well done, Dragons. Showed great spirit, and fully deserved.

GLove39 wrote:What a try by the Amos!

It was Meyer who scored, after some good work by Hewitt and then Amos.

Munchkin wrote:Ulster are a pathetic shambles of a team. Disgusted at them.

They've brought the team into disrepute today. Furious doesn't cover it.

Gilroy, Scholes and Allen are the only players who can look themselves in the eye.

Hey guys do you remember the good old days when we had a good pack who were capable of taking to the pitch without disgracing themselves, yes thats right last year.

The Saint wrote:

GLove39 wrote:What a try by the Amos!

It was Meyer who scored, after some good work by Hewitt and then Amos.

My bad!

Was he allowed to even take that quick lineout?

It was great to see Hewitt drawing the tacklers before passing. Nothing special. Pretty simple in fact. Just something that seems to elude attacking teams a lot these days. He held the drift and allowed Amos the chance to split the two defenders and create the overlap.

Well done Williams normally subbed a bit of luck and another try

And now we show why we lose so many games. Just throw the game away half the time. Ulster have been poor but are in with a shout of winning the game now,.

Yeah, Notch. I haven't been this angry with them for a long long time. Gilroy has really stood out from the rest over the last few games. Pienaar is well off his best.

For a guy who likes to carry the ball in one hand Nick Williams needs to do better when carrying it in two

Deserved win, what now who is reffing this game

We grab an undeserved losing bonus point at the death.

The fact we've suddenly woken up in the last 10 minutes just makes our performance throughout the game even more disgusting. We just thought it would happen for us and we didn't need to bother our arse.

Disgraceful attitude and performance from Ulster today.

Stupid play by Ulster 18 at that ruck

Deserved win, what now who is reffing this game

He took a swing at an Ulster player there, however it looked as if the that Ulster player stood on the knee of someone on the ground. Nothing in it anyway as the final whistle is blown. I didn't think that quick throw-in was allowed either, ball had touched the stand/someone else.

Particularly impressed by the Dragons pack, thought they did a job on Ulster, and that was with missing their captain Landman.

Well done Dragons.

Well deserved win.

Well done Dragons you deserved the win, we deserved nothing from that game, it was horrible only our back 3 stood up today if Doak lets those players out of that dressing room before nightfall he is doing it wrong.

Well done Risca and co. enjoy the day. Fully deserved and I thought the ref was decent too.

I wish I had the will not to renew my season ticket, or at least know that any threat isn't totally hollow

Thought they were going to go back to look at the ruck beforehand when Ulster 18 / 19? went hurtling into the ruck an age after the ball had left.

Anyway, what an entertaining match. And a great result for glasgow!

wayne wrote:Come on now Dragons, you can make it 4-0 tomorrow, you know you can do it.

See, you have to have a bit of confidence, WELL DONE DRAGONS

Dragons deserved to win. Sorry our useless, lazy forwards and headless halfbacks meant you didn't get a proper game.

This game was so important for Ulster in terms of gaining an advantage over Munster and Leinster and they went through the motions. Absolutely disgraceful.

Griff, Risca ...et al, enjoy that result, great performance from your forwards Oh yes, and thanks from the 'T'Ospreys

I think credit to Ulster too. For playing poorly, or disgracefully as some of you have pointed out, your didn't do too bad on the scoreboard. Could have nabbed it there. I think that shows your quality and points to our soft underbelly.

Very happy with the win. I'll always be ultra critical of the Dragons though. So many times I've seen us race into a lead only to switch off and concede a load of points. Our goal must be to improve at closing games out. Get the lead and then shut up shop, somehow. It's not easy against quality opposition, admittedly. But those two tries Ulster scored towards the end were far too easy. We must do better in this facet of our game.

Here's the thing, I am so annoyed with that not because it was a bad performance which people can have, not because of mistakes which people can make but because at the heart oif the matter there was 0 commitment, 0 effort, 0 desire shown today by abotu 13 of those Ulster players and that is thoroughly unacceptable.

neilthom7 wrote:Here's the thing, I am so annoyed with that not because it was a bad performance which people can have, not because of mistakes which people can make but because at the heart oif the matter there was 0 commitment, 0 effort, 0 desire shown today by abotu 13 of those Ulster players and that is thoroughly unacceptable.

What has happened to Ulster this year, this is not the first game they have not turned up for. They always used to!

Stuart Davies looks so happy and enthusiastic !!

Dragons continue to baffle me - beat Leinster away and almost beat a good connaught side with 14 men, then go and lose against a weakened Zebre side despite having domination at set piece and then win against a strong Ulster side at home...

I don't think Ulster were at their best today but I thought our defence went well - too much aimless kicking from both sides...

Amos is the form attacking winger in Wales atm

BigGee wrote:

neilthom7 wrote:Here's the thing, I am so annoyed with that not because it was a bad performance which people can have, not because of mistakes which people can make but because at the heart oif the matter there was 0 commitment, 0 effort, 0 desire shown today by abotu 13 of those Ulster players and that is thoroughly unacceptable.

What has happened to Ulster this year, this is not the first game they have not turned up for. They always used to!

I think a couple of things have happened some guys seem to have got a bit complacent, there is a lack of leadership that we had last year Muller retired and it's his leadership we miss most. Best is away with Ireland too and even Wilson wasn't there today. Not only that but at big times our big players were steping up lat year and thats not happening at the minute. No Muller, no Ferris at all this year. Henry, Trimble, Bowe, Payne, Best and Jackson all out or away who were guys who in previous years stepped up for us at big times and Pienaar hasn't really hit his straps entirely after the injury at the start of the season. Only Gilroy has really stepped up for us int he last few games.

Of course there is also issues which have been about now for 4 or 5 games and haven't been sorted and those are 3 fold. 1. Kicking game is very poor, the complete oposite to Irelands's and at this stage I think we need to sacrifice Humphreys for either Stanley or Pienaar at 10. 2. Rucks- where are our back rowers in these, they just are not hitting them and it means we don't get clean ball or we get turne dover or get pens against us or whatever. Lack of a real quality 7 doesn't help but all of them need to step up.
3. Indiscipline/Mistakes, our penalty count is out of hand with guys doing stupid stuff all over the park, coupled with mistakes being made at crucial times and it's not good.
These 3 essentials need to be sorted and if they are then we might go places. It's now down to the players to knuckle down and the coaches to make them do the right things.