Ulster 30 Aironi 6:THE SCORELINE was hardly a surprise, as Ulster opened their Heineken Cup campaign with an essential bonus point to take maximum points in Pool Four, but things didn't quite pan out the way the home side would have wanted as they huffed and puffed before finally pulling away in the latter part of the game.
Lack of precision near the Aironi try line robbed Ulster of a hatful of scoring opportunities against a weakened Italian side that battled hard.
Ruan Pienaar made his presence felt again, and grabbed the bonus point try when it finally came in the 67th minute, but his kicking let him down with only two successes from five attempts with Ian Humphreys taking over to land two late conversions.
Indeed it was Humphreys who helped set Ulster on their way with an opportunist score early in the second half – a moment Nick Williams will not care to remember. That helped compose the home side for the task ahead after now going six games unbeaten in all competitions; namely the acquisition of a bonus point ahead of next weekend’s visit to Biarritz.
Ulster bristled with intent from the off and, on receiving the kick-off, even with a fumble from Chris Henry, launched an immediate attack which saw them storm into Aironi’s 22 where Pienaar landed his first penalty with not even two minutes on the clock.
However, things didn’t quite develop in the way Ulster had wanted and the remainder of the half was about Aironi staying in touch and Ulster spilling a number of scoring chances.
Ludovic Mercier levelled the scores on five minutes after some crossing in Ulster’s ranks and then with Pienaar missing his second kick at goal after the ball hit the upright, Mercier put Aironi in an unlikely lead when Ulster went in on the wrong side at a maul.
Still, Ulster were still showing plenty of intent with ball in hand and just after Andrew Trimble was pinged for taking an awful forward pass from Darren Cave, the home side’s pack took complete charge at the following scrum.
A huge surge drove Aironi off the ball and after Robbie Diack picked up and broke right, Pienaar produced an exquisite flick pass to Trimble and the Ireland winger got over in the corner in the 21st minute and even narrowed the angle for Pienaar’s conversion.
However, the Springbok put the extras wide which prompted a period of Ulster dominance helped by the binning of Marco Bortolami for killing the ball.
However, a series of errors as Ulster on several occasions looked certain to score meant that when Bortolami returned Pienaar had just managed a single penalty to put Ulster only 11-6 up the break.
With such lack of precision, Ulster needed a break and they got one just after the restart when former Munster player Williams made a terrible hash of a Humphreys kick to the left corner, allowing Humphreys to follow up and to his amazement get his hands on the ball to touch it down. Pienaar couldn’t conquer the tight angle for the conversion.
That seemed to take most of the fight from Aironi and on the hour mark, Ulster scored their third try. It came from the home side losing their own lineout but Henry charged through and snaffled the ball before leading an attack up the right with Muller and Best.
The ball was quickly recycled and Jamie Smith provided Simon Danielli with the scoring pass which the Scotland winger juggled before getting it down. Humphreys landed a fine conversion.
Now it was just a case of when the bonus point would come and great work from Diack allowed Pienaar dart over to the right of the posts, Humphreys’ second successful conversion making it 30-6 and giving Ulster all they required.
ULSTER: J Smith; A Trimble, D Cave, P Wallace, S Danielli; I Humphreys, R Pienaar; B Young, R Best (Capt), T Court, J Muller, T Barker, P Wannenburg, C Henry, R Diack. Replacements: I Whitten for Cave (45 mins), D Tuohy for Barker (52 mins), P McAllister for Young (62 mins), D McIlwaine for Smith (64), W Faloon for , P Wannenburg (66), A Whitten for Court (70), P Marshall for Pienaar (72), N Brady for P Wallace (74).
AIRONI: D Demas, G Toniolatti , R Penney, G Pavan, G Venditti, L Mercier, T Tebaldi, A de Marchi, R Santamaria, L Redolfini, C del Fava [capt], M Bortolami, A Benatti, A Birchall, N Williams. Replacements: P Canavosio for Tebaldim (ht); R Bocchino for L Mercier (52 mins); N Cattina for Birchall (55 mins), S Perugini for Redolfini (57), G Pizarro for Pavan (70 mins).
Referee: C White (England).
