Battling Ulster end Stade unbeaten run

Ulster 18 Stade Francais 10

A battling Ulster performance gave Stade their first taste of defeat in this season’s Heineken Cup and kept Ulster’s slim chances of qualification alive in a bruising encounter at Ravenhill.

David Humphreys, who carried a toe injury into the game, scored 13 of Ulster’s points with a try, conversion, drop goal and penalty as the visitors were put to the sword.

Stade, who led the pool on 14 points before today and had never won at Ravenhill, were blown away by a rare showing of Ulster passion and less profligate use of possession.

A superb individual try from Kieran Campbell set Ulster on their way late in the first half and they never looked back to record only their third win at home all season.

Ulster made the worst start possible and shortly after losing one of the first line-outs of the day, they found themselves trailing 7-0 with only two minutes gone.

With Agustin Pichot immediately causing trouble around the fringes, Stade had Ulster on the back foot and had acres of space when Pichot fed David Skrela.

The Stade fly-half put in a kick behind the Ulster backline and Juan Hernandez seemed to have unlimited time to wait for the ball to roll over the line before touching down. Skrela added the difficult conversion.

Stade’s dominance continued, with their line-out variations and driving off the side leaving Ulster’s defence looking leaden-footed, but they were unable to reflect this in the scoreline.

Just as in Paris last week, Ulster clung on without bringing any obvious cutting edge in bringing the ball forward.

Humphreys did narrow the score with a penalty after nine minutes and then Skrela missed a 13th-minute effort when his attempt bounced out off the upright.

Two minutes before the half hour it was Humphreys’ turn to push a penalty wide and this seemed to stir Stade to try to get something going in a game which was getting bogged down in grim stalemate.

Mirco Bergamasco got on the end of a kick and chase for 50 metres but just failed to get the touchdown as the ball rolled dead and then Brian Liebenberg’s grubber for Stephane Glas was snaffled by Bryn Cunningham.

Humphreys was short with a 50m penalty effort on 40 minutes before, out of nowhere, Ulster grabbed an injury-time try.

Campbell ran a penalty and just kept going, beating three Stade defenders to slide over to the left of the posts.

Humphreys, though, missed the relatively simple conversion and Ulster ended the half 8-7 ahead.

Stade came out for the second half determined to hit the ground running but could only manage a Skrela drop goal after sustained pressure on the Ulster line.

After earlier hitting the upright again with a penalty, Skrela pushed another chance wide and Stade’s game began to visibly disintegrate.

Two minutes after the hour, Ulster struck a decisive blow. The ball was moved right and Humphreys was put in space on the wing.

He made the corner and then added a superb conversion to take it to 15-10 for the home side.

The Ulster fly-half then produced a searing drop goal from over 40 metres to even deny Stade a bonus point they hardly deserved.