Rugby:Irish flanker Stephen Ferris has failed to recover from back spasms in time for Friday's Heineken Cup Pool 4 match against Glasgow Warriors at Scotstoun Stadium (kick off 8pm). It's a blow to an impressive Ulster team that has had one of its best ever starts to the season but allows impressive youngster Iain Henderson retain his place in the Ulster backrow at blindside flanker.
In all coach Mark Anscombe made just two changes to the team that beat Castres last week, the principle change being South African Ruan Pienaar coming in for the impressive Paul Marshall in what must have been a tough call for the coach.
While Pienaar scored the bonus point winning try as a replacement last week against the French side and starts at scrumhalf, Marshall -
who deputised for the Springbok during the Rugby Championship - scored two tries in a man of the match display.
Nick Williams also makes a return having recovered from a rib injury picked up in the RaboDirect PRO12 win over Connacht a fortnight ago. Williams will start the game at number 8 in place of Mike McComish, who is named on the bench.
“Paul played outstanding last week and he showed what he is capable of with a man of the match performance. But we’re in the position where we have two fantastic options at scrumhalf,” said Anscombe.
“Ruan came on and showed what a quality player he is with his distribution and try at the end. We have to select the team to win specific games and that’s what we’ve done for this weekend. Rugby is an 80 minute game and it’s important to have someone like Paul, who can come on and make an impact.”
The Ulster coach is also pleased to have back row Nick Williams available. “Nick has trained all week and has proved that he is 100% fit. He’s looked sharp and it’s good to have him back in the team,” added Anscombe.
Anscombe’s reign as Ulster coach has been characterised by squad rotation but there has been a more settled look about the team in recent weeks. He commented, “We’re getting more and more players back from injury and it is allowing us to get close to a full strength team. We now just have a couple of players missing so it’s looking quite promising.”
Glasgow has beaten Ulster in just one in their last five encounters, but the New Zealand coach is not taking anything for granted. “Glasgow are a formidable team, particularly at home. We have to play for the full 80 minutes against them if we are to come away with the win. We can’t afford to put in a performance for 50 or 60 minutes like we have done in previous weeks,” he said.
Gregor Townsend’s team know they must emerge victorious to sustain their ambitions of progressing to the knock-out stages after last week’s narrow defeat away to English Premiership leaders Northampton Saints,
“This is another landmark night for the club, and we’re all absolutely determined to claim what would be a vital win,” said Townsend. “We were pleased with how we performed in the first 30 minutes at Northampton, but are well aware that against the calibre of opponents we play in this competition, we need to be at the top of our game for the full 80.
“Our 18-10 defeat to Ulster on the first night of the RaboDirect PRO12 season was quite similar to the Northampton game, in that we did a lot of things very well but didn’t quite sustain it over the piece.
“As their results show, Ulster have improved since then, but we have as well. We go into the game with confidence, pushing to secure the win for what’s shaping up to be a big home crowd.”
Elsewhere in the backline, Peter Murchie will start at outside centre, Sean Lamont missing out with the facial injury he suffered at Northampton and which is still subject to further assessment. Alex Dunbar will line up on the left wing.
There are two changes up front, Tom Ryder getting the nod over Tim Swinson in the second row and Chris Fusaro coming in for John Barclay at openside flanker. The Warriors welcome back Rob Harley, who has been missing since the start of September with a knee injury.
The Glasgow wing, Tommy Seymour
has been suspended for one week following an independent Disciplinary Hearing in Dublin following a citing made against him from the Heineken Cup Pool 4 match against Northampton Saints last Sunday.
The complaint was made by Citing Commissioner, Yves Thieffine (France), for an alleged dangerous ‘tip’ tackle on the Northampton Saints wing, Vasily Artemyev during the second half of the match at Franklin’s Gardens.
The Judicial Officer upheld the citing complaint and decided that the offence warranted a low-end entry point of four weeks.but felt that a four week suspension would be “wholly disproportionate”.
Accordingly, and based on the presence of a number of mitigating factors, including Seymour’s clean record, the Judicial Officer reduced the sanction to a one week suspension.
Glasgow:S Hogg; B McGuigan, P Murchie, P Horne, A Dunbar; R Jackson, H Pyrgos; R Grant, D Hall, M Cusack, T Ryder, A Kellock ©, J Strauss, C Fusaro, R Wilson. Replacements– F Gilles, O Fainga' anuku, G Reid, T Swinson, R Harley, J Barclay, S Wight, N Matawalu
Ulster:J Payne; T Bowe, D Cave, P Wallace, A Trimble; P Jackson, R Pienaar: T Court, R Best, J Afoa, J Muller (c), D Tuohy, I Henderson, C Henry, N Williams. Replacements:R Herring, C Black, A Macklin, L Stevenson, M McComish, P Marshall, L Marshall, C Gilroy.
