Gerry Thornley On Rugby: It may only have been the inaugural Celtic Cup, it may not amount to a hill of beans by the end of the season, but Ulster's triumph in Edinburgh last Saturday is a significant boost for them and will have positive effects for the rest of the Irish provinces and for Irish rugby.
Bottom line: the more winners' medals circulating in Irish rugby the better.
Irish players don't win enough, partly because there isn't an awful lot around to win. Internationally, there's the Six Nations championship, Triple Crown and the World Cup, provincially there's the Heineken European Cup/Parker Pen Challenge Cup, Celtic League and, only now, the Celtic Cup.
The latter may be bottom of the pecking order but it's a trophy, along with individual winners' medals. It inspired an estimated 2,500-3,000 supporters to brave rough crossings over the Irish Sea. And, of course, it inspired a win. It exposed Ulster and Irish rugby in a positive light to a wider television audience. It will have imbued the Ulster squad with confidence and generate even greater fervour among their supporters. "To be honest, it sounded like we were playing in Ravenhill," said coach Alan Solomons yesterday, and demand for tickets for the European Cup game against Leicester at Ravenhill, assuredly another 12,000 sell-out, on January 11th will be even more acute, and Ulster will be a better team for last Saturday's win.
Ulster's triumph will also heighten interest in the quasi-interprovincial games on the first weekend of the New Year, especially for their visit to Donnybrook to play Leinster. When Solomons says Ulster's victory is also good for Irish rugby it isn't just a trite soundbite. "Of course there is plenty of sibling rivalry between the provinces but they also all feed off each other, and are inspired by each other's successes," he says. "Munster's win at home to Gloucester last season was a brilliant example of that," he adds. "Leinster's performances in the European Cup have been terrific and we will enjoy the challenge of going down to Donnybrook. The provinces back each other to the hilt. All the other provinces sent us good luck messages before the game and we do the same when they're playing big games."
"The bulk of the Irish side is picked from Leinster and Munster, and they are two of the most powerful sides in Europe, but if we can bridge that gap between them and us then that is good for Irish rugby."
With nine of the players involved last Saturday having learned the game in the Southern Hemisphere, one can understand why Solomons is always so keen to articulate the contributions of his home-grown youngsters, but he surely has a valid point when stating the experience of winning a cup final away from home will have done immeasurable good for the likes of Roger Wilson and Neil Best.
Wilson looked the part in direct opposition to the gifted Simon Taylor and Solomons repeated his assertion, "our three young loose forwards, Roger Wilson, Neil Best and Neil McMillian will one day form the Irish back row," adding the name of second-row Matt McCullough for good measure. It ought, by rights, have been 10 Southern Hemisphere players in last Saturday's squad except Andy Ward has long since lost his Kiwi accent and by now is as much part of the Ulster and Irish fabric as any of his team-mates.
"He's been captain in my three years here and I can honestly say this has been the best season he's had. He's an inspirational leader who leads from the front and it's also what he says when he deals with the players. He has that warrior spirit," says Solomons.
The Ulster coach put the occasion "right up there" with Currie Cup finals and Tri-Nations matches. Speaking en route to Ravenhill yesterday for a video session analysing Saturday's final, Solomons had already reviewed the tape. "It really was a very closely fought and hard-fought game. Some of our defence was outstanding and when we got opportunities we took them," he said, allowing for two missed tackles in the build-up to two of Edinburgh's three second-half tries.
That Ulster did take their opportunities was in large part down to the opportunism of their talisman David Humphreys. Retaining Adam Larkin at outhalf, who had guided the Celtic Cup campaign during Humphreys's absence, and thus allowing the latter to link up with the rest of the Irish squad in their warm-weather training camp in Lanzarote, might have seemed a viable option. But despite the Irish management's keenness for him not to, Humphreys desperately wanted to play, and Solomons was equally keen on the idea. Not only did Humphreys land six-from-seven kicks in atrocious conditions, but even Ulster's brace of first-half tries came from his diagonal up-and-under and his neat soccer skills.
Although some of the Ulster faithful would like to see a more expansive approach from their side at times, Saturday's conditions (perhaps coupled with the absence of Ryan Constable) did not allow them to reproduce the try-scoring form which has taken them to the top of the Celtic League. Solomons must take some of the credit for Ulster's transformation under him, which has also seen them twice reach Celtic League semi-finals as well as compete strongly in European Cup pools with four wins from six matches in each of the last two seasons.
There seems to be an acceptance his three-year tenure will come to an end at the end of this season, though he is giving little away.
"I've been very happy in Ulster and Ireland, and the people from the Ulster Branch and the IRFU have been very supportive. I didn't really want to make any decisions up until now because it has been such a difficult period but I will have to sit down and think about my future in the relatively short term."
gthornley@irish-times.ie
