Mike Blair’s final match as Edinburgh head coach ended in another disappointing defeat as their season concluded with a 12th loss in the URC at Kingspan Stadium in Belfast.
Without an away win in the league since October, this was always going to be a tall order for Edinburgh against an Ulster side battling to hold on to second spot in the table.
And, in a way, the display summed up Edinburgh’s frustrating season. Plenty of opportunity, no shortage of effort but lacking the cohesion and accuracy of execution to make that count where it matter most.
In contrast, Ulster made the most of what they created to run out winners by double scores and will now have home advantage in the quarter-finals and the semi-finals if they make it that far.
The bonus point win by the reigning champions Stormers over Benetton earlier in the evening in Stellenbosch moved them above Ulster into second place, so that cranked up the pressure on Dan McFarland’s to secure their 13th win of the campaign.
But while Ulster started well they made few inroads into a solid Edinburgh defence and huge home following was silenced as the visitors showed a sharper edge in attack.
Duhan van der Merwe was unable to gather the ball after a grubber from Blair Kinghorn into the left corner after seven minutes after a flowing crossfield move.
And with Mark Bennett superb, Edinburgh pushed on and deservedly hit the front a minute later when Ulster prop Jeff Toomaga-Allen knocked on in midfield and with an advantage playing, the Scots sprayed it wide with Bennett making huge ground with a dummy before feeding back inside for Darcy Graham to race in for a fine try.
Emiliano Boffelli slotted a fine conversion to stretch the lead to 7-0 before the heavy exchanges forced a couple of changes on either side for head injuries, with Edinburgh losing Cammy Hutchinson and Dave Cherry and Ulster’s Mike Lowry and Rob Herring also forced to go off.
Cherry’s withdrawal meant an earlier introduction than expected for Stuart McInally for his final game for Edinburgh before his retirement after the World Cup.
Both sides, remarkably, were forced to make further changes at the break due to HIA with Ulster losing winger Rob Baloucoune and Edinburgh tighthead Luan de Bruin also having to go off.
Edinburgh had opportunities to build on their early lead but didn’t take them as Ulster got their act together in defence.
Ulster hit back 13 minutes from the break with an excellent try, working the ball quickly through the hands across the field with replacement centre Craig Gilroy, who announced midweek that he is leaving Ulster at the end of the season, making ground and when Baloucoune was nabbed by var der Merwe in the right corner, he managed to feed the ball back inside for Jacob Stockdale to score.
John Cooney was unable to add the difficult conversion but he landed two excellent penalties from 40 metres on the right just before the break to take an 11-7 lead into the interval.
Edinburgh came out firing after the restart but disaster struck when Kinghorn’s slow pass was easily read by Cooney who ran from outside halfway to score in the left corner, before then adding the conversion to push the lead out to 18-7 after 43 minutes.
Edinburgh never looked like staging a serious comeback, although it wasn’t until the closing 15 minutes that Ulster made the game safe.
Good pressure by Ulster and a heavy penalty count by Edinburgh inevitably led to a yellow card with lock Glen Young pinged and the home side quickly made the numerical advantage count. They tapped the resultant penalty in front of the posts and a few phases later flanker Nick Timoney squeezed over, with Cooney’s conversion making it 25-7.
McInally almost signed off in style when he burst from outside the 22 before he was nabbed in the left corner by Kieran Treadwell and while he managed to offload in the tackle, van der Merwe was unable to hold the ball by the fingertips and the chance was lost after 71 minutes.
A minute later Charlie Savala touched down but the try was scratched dubiously when Jamie Ritchie was pinged for a knock-on when he did well to juggle the ball as he was tackled.
But they did get a consolation score five minutes from time when WP Nel struck from close range, with Boffelli adding the points as
the curtain came down on a frustrating season.
