Ulster's best efforts fall short

Cardiff Blues 21 Ulster 14:AN EARLY Robbie Diack try was not enough as Ulster's winning streak in the PRO12 came to a shuddering halt in Cardiff.

Ulster led at the interval thanks to Diack’s try and the boot of Ruan Pienaar but Cardiff Blues fought back with second-half tries from Dan Parks and Tom James to steal the victory.

With just one point separating the two sides, Ulster boss Brian McLaughlin described the encounter as an opportunity for his side to take one of their play-off rivals out of the equation.

And the they went into the clash on the back of a rich vein of form with six bonus-point wins in their last eight matches in all competitions.

But they were put to the sword by the Blues, playing at their spiritual Arms Park home, and failed to climb into the play-off places – they instead dropped to sixth while the Blues rise to fourth.

Pienaar charged down Lloyd Williams’ box kick to provide Ulster with an early opportunity to open the scoring but the South African was unable to regather the ball.

Ulster continued to pin the Blues inside their own ‘22’ and they earned their reward when Tom James was penalised for holding onto the ball and Pienaar landed the resulting penalty.

McLaughlin’s men extended their lead on 19 minutes thanks to powerhouse number eight Diack. The Blues over-threw at the lineout and Diack hacked through before beating scrum-half Williams in a foot race to crash over.

Pienaar failed with the tricky conversion and Parks cut the deficit on 22 minutes with the Blues’ first points.

Ulster restored their eight-point advantage on 37 minutes thanks to another penalty from Pienaar after the Blues caused their own problems with loose kicks.

But Parks made amends for his earlier mistake by slotting a superb touchline penalty to bring the scores to 11-6 at the interval.

The hosts, now with a strong wind at their backs, made a flying start to the second-half and levelled the scores within two minutes of the restart.

Following strong build-up play, Parks fired a long pass to Ben Blair, who was held agonisingly short by the sterling defence of Nevin Spence and Ian Whitten, but the fly-half was on hand to dive over from close-range.

Ulster fought back with some swift counterattacks and had the Blues on the ropes for a second time thanks to a charge down from Paddy Wallace but were unable to take advantage of the opportunity.

And the Blues punished Ulster for their lack of killer-instinct when James ran clear on 59 minutes. Former Welsh golden boy Gavin Henson produced a moment of magic to release namesake Evans, who drew Stefan Terblanche to release the wing.

Parks added the extras to hand the Blues an 18-11 lead but was unable to stretch it further with a penalty moments later after Ian Humphreys was sent to the sin-bin for a deliberate knock on.

Parks and Pienaar exchanged penalties to bring the scores to 21-14 with less than 10 minutes to go and that was how it finished.

CARDIFF BLUES: B Blair; R Mustoe, G Evans, G Henson, T James; D Parks, L Williams; J Yapp, R Tyrell, S Andrews, C Hill, P Tito (capt), M Paterson, M Williams, X Rush. Replacements: R Rees for L Williams (50 mins), M Molitika for Hill (54), TR Thomas for Tyrell (60), C Czekaj for Blair (60). Replacements not used: N Trevett, R Harford, M Cook, C Sweeney.

ULSTER: S Terblanche; C Gilroy, N Spence, P Wallace, I Whitten; I Humphreys, R Pienaar; T Court, N Brady, J Afoa, L Stevenson, D Tuohy, C Henry (capt), W Faloon, R Diack. Replacements: P McAllister for Court (51), A D’Arcy for Terblanche (61), A Kyriacou for Brady (65), P Marshall for Diack (69), M McComish for Humphreys (75). Replacements not used:

A Macklin, T Barker, S Danielli.

Referee: George Clancy (IRFU).