ULSTER 14-15 MUNSTER
Rory Scannell proves hero with late drop goal winner.
Few expected Munster would be able to follow up their sensational yet emotionally draining win over Glasgow Warriors with a win over league-leading Ulster. NO-ONE expected it when they trailed 14-0 after 30 minutes.
But they pulled off an amazing, battling win and fully deserved it.
Les Kiss' men have looked primed for a charge at the league from Round One but recent defeats to Connacht and Bordeaux [in Europe] had winded them. Paddy Jackson's drop goal heroics against Exeter had reversed the slide. He did most of his damage with kicks of the cross-field variety tonight.
Ulster started as the aggressors and were eager to let a surely sapped Munster team know that nothing would come easy. Wiehahn Herbst demonstrated that by barging straight through Rory Scannell in one gain-making carry and Ulster, momentum on their side, made it count.
Jackson pumped a cross-field ball that Craig Gilroy got to ahead of Andrew Conway. Piutau gathered the bouncing ball, cruised over, Jackson converted and Munster were 7-0 down before 10 minutes were up.
The remainder of the half saw Ulster soak Munster pressure then make it count when a chance presented itself to them. Luke Marshall and Tommy Bowe were eager and forceful with a couple of important defensive interventions.
Ulster's second try came out of seemingly nothing. Rob Lyttle - on for the injured Darren Cave - spotted a gap in Munster's drift defence that you could get a stretch Hummer through. He jinked inside some flailing hands and had too much gas for the covering defender. 14-0 and Munster were in trouble.
On the visitors pressed, undeterred, and they were rewarded just before the break when Darren Sweetnam found inside centre Rory Scannell loitering on the right wing. Ian Keatley missed the resulting conversion to add to a penalty he botched to comic laughter earlier in the piece.
If Ulster have been guilty of anything over the past decade since they last won silverware, it is that they don't put sides away when they should.
14-5 after the break and they had the running of it for the first 15 minutes without ever really cutting through the red ranks. Marshall, who could well partner Robbie Henshaw for Ireland next week, got his team on the front foot with some decent carries but Munster were not unduly troubled.
The hosts' took a breather and Munster took advantage. They worked their way up the left-hand flank and mauled themselves deep into the Ulster 22. A couple of picks and drives before Jaco Taute took possession a few metres out and crashed over. With Keatley off, Rory Scannell converted and it was suddenly a two-point game.
An unfortunate incident with a stray firework shot into the skies above Belfast led to a Jackson penalty miss that elicited disbelieving laughter around Kingspan Stadium.
https://twitter.com/SportsJOEdotie/status/792090228366381056
No-one was laughing on 75 minutes when a Munster side, now in the ascendancy, barrelled deep into the Ulster half and drove white jerseys back until they were in drop goal position.
No Keatley, no Tyler Bleyendaal... no problem.
Rory Scannell had been practicing drop goals in the warm-ups and it paid off. Over she soared.
Fists pumped, job done.
He is not travelling to Chicago but we may yet see him in green next month.
Munster are back and there's no bloody doubt about it now.
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