We have no chance of making last eight: Kingston
HARLEQUINS Director of Rugby John Kingston admitted his side have no hope of making the Champions Cup quarter-finals after Ulster consigned them to a third defeat in as many games in this season’s competition at the Twickenham Stoop yesterday.
Four penalties from John Cooney and a lone Jacob Stockdale try were enough to hand the visitors a 17-5 win, with the result meaning there is little at stake but pride for Harlequins when the sides do it all again at Kingspan Stadium on Friday night.
“We’re out of it now, I’m not going to be splitting hairs or anything like that,” Kingston said of his side’s European campaign.
“We can’t qualify when we’ve lost three matches. It’s disappointing because we haven’t been in this tournament for three years. Realistically we weren’t going to spring in after that and start dominating Europe.
“But what we’ve got to do is, for the three games left, learn lessons so that if and when we are back in this competition we can make more of a fist of it.
“Against La Rochelle we were excellent, against Wasps we let ourselves down, and here it was nip and tuck but we didn’t get the win we needed.”
With just a five-day turnaround to the second leg of this back-to-back, Kingston added that, given his injury problems, he may not have much chance to rotate things even with big Premiership clashes over the festive period in mind.
“We’ve got to show some pride and what we are on Friday night,” he said. “Selection won’t be difficult because I’m not sure I have 23 fit players who are registered.
“We’ve got to dust ourselves down a bit and get ready for it. We have to reset where we are and I’ve already had a chat with the guys about that.
“There’s everything to play for in the Premiership, we’re only a few points of the top four, and in the Anglo-Welsh but we’re out of Europe.” HARLEQUINS: M Brown (capt); C Walker, A Alofa, J Roberts, T Visser; M Smith, D Care; J Marler, E Elia, K Sinckler; G Merrick, C Matthews; R Bothma, C Robshaw, M Luamanu.
Replacements: D Ward (for Elia, 79), L Boyce (for Boyce, 69), P Swainston, D Lamb (for Matthews, 79), A White (For Robshaw, 15), I Prior (for Care, 43), W Stanley, R Chisholm.
ULSTER: C Piutau; C Gilroy, T Bowe, S McCloskey, J Stockdale; C Lealiifano, J Cooney; C Black, R Herring, W Herbst; A O’Connor, K Treadwell, I Henderson (capt), S Reidy, N Timoney.
Replacements: J Andrew, A Warwick (for Black, 70), R Kane (for Herbst, 63), M Rea, C Henry (for Treadwell, 51), P Marshall, P Nelson, L Ludik (for Bowe, 47).
Referee: Pascal Gauzere (France).
Man of the match: John Cooney (ULS)
A snow-swept Twickenham Stoop could hardly have felt further away from May’s Champions Cup final in Bilbao, but Ulster kept their European ambitions alive yesterday with a gritty win over a Harlequins side whose own quarter-final hopes are now firmly in the past.
The 5-17 success, a first victory on English soil for almost four years, was a game won when Ulster adapted better to the wintery weather and where their supposedly less powerful pack was brilliantly led by stand-in captain Iain Henderson.
For all the efforts of the forward eight though, somewhat predictably, it was once again that man Jacob Stockdale who grabbed the headlines with his ninth score in nine starts this season proving a catalyst for victory.
Man-of-the-match John Cooney was another in good form, the scrum-half quickly getting to grips with a game that was always to be an arm wrestle once snow descended on London overnight, as well as kicking four penalties on a day when at times it would have been tough to pick out the posts against an increasingly white backdrop.
In a game that was billed as a sell-out, there were plenty of gaps in the stands as things kicked off underneath a fresh flurry, locals and travelling fans alike hit by travel disruption that saw Saracens and Clermont, due to be played only 15 miles north, fall victim to the weather.
Coming in, Harlequins had already lost both their games to date in this season’s competition but, having had to battle their way to a place at Europe’s top table, were not about to give up on a quarter-final spot in the face of long odds. It was the visitors, though, who made the first foray into the opposing ‘22’ after Stockdale had done well and Tim Visser missed Craig Gilroy.
The pressure brought about a penalty when Quins were caught offside, Cooney providing the first points of the game with just six minutes on the clock.
Familiar failings would soon raise their head however, Charlie Matthews stealing an Ulster lineout that soon after gave Mar- cus Smith a chance to stroke a penalty to the edge of the ‘22’. A knock-on from Renaldo Bothma though, gave Ulster a chance to escape.
Slippery conditions were making handling something of an adventure, but Ulster put together a move of real quality to move from their try-line to the Harlequins 22, although Cooney was just prevented from poking a grubber through for Tommy Bowe.
A penalty in the build-up gave another chance for a line-out, this time Ulster setting up an effective maul that brought another blast of Pascal Gauzere’s whistle. In worsening conditions, Cooney would push his effort across the posts but scrumhalf was to the fore when Ulster scored their only try.
After both sides utilised a bit of kick-tennis to test the opposing back three’s ability to field balls that, quite literally, came down with snow on them, Cooney gathered loose possession in midfield and broke forwards.
While hauled down short him-