THIS WAS A result that was only ever going to go one way.
Ulster scored seven tries, 48 points and conceded precisely zero.
In the Heineken Cup it doesn’t get much more one-sided than that.
Treviso looked a shell of the team whose upward curve began seriously troubling some of the top sides in Europe last season.
Those looking for a contest in this game hoped that the midweek criticism of club president Amerino Zatta pointing at a ‘lack of hunger’ might just light the green and white touchpaper and wind this team into a performance. Instead, it seemed to act more like a final nail in the coffin of Franco Smith’s side.
The visitors did wrestle control of the game away from the hosts for a period after half-time, but by then the damage had already been done. With the score 22 – 0 the attritional phases on the five-metre line only ever felt like a means of running the clock down.
Right from the off, it was Ulster who looked to have the bloodlust of a point that needed proving and the only shock about the opening try was that it hadn’t arrived sooner than the fifth minute.
The same emotion took hold when the fourth try arrived courtesy of Dan Tuohy; job done, the bonus point sealed, a full 30 minutes of play after John Afoa had claimed the third.
On a night like this, with the return fixture next Saturday the perfect spot for an ambush, it was natural for Mark Anscombe to claw at areas which might call for some improvement – however few there were.
“We lost our focus a bit at the beginning of the second half,” said the Kiwi coach.
“We came out of the tunnel and it took us about 15 minutes to get into our work which is something we’ve got to address.”
No obvious injuries? Right, that’s the negatives out of the way. Time for Anscombe look on the bright side: the quality of game management, the desire to mercilessly power their advantage home and the manner in which lesser lights such as Sean Doyle and Rob Herring slotted in seamlessly. Indeed, the latter filled Rory Best’s shoes with a man-of-the-match display.
“To score seven tries, nearly score 50 and concede none you’ve got be happy,” Anscombe added.
“At the end of the day they still have a team with a lot of international footballers and they didn’t come here and lay down, so you’ve got to give credit to the boys for the way they came and laid on seven tries.”
Jolt
Within that magnificent tally there were six different scorers. Luke Marshall was the one man to double up with fine individual effort after a mazy run in the first quarter and a commendable show of stamina to accelerate away from the would-be tackler after taking a 75th minute pass from Jackson who created the opening with a line-break.
Marshall’s sin-binning during the lone period of real Italian pressure may be a black mark against his name. But giving away the penalty in front of the posts had the desired effect in disrupting Treviso and even jolted the hosts into second half action – they would end up scoring 14 points with the number 12 temporarily sidelined.
Watching the young centre gallop to the north stand after a performance in which he added brains and brawn in equal measure to the Ulster attack was the icing on a perfect Saturday night in the ever-expanding Ravenhill.
However, that is now the double-edged sword Ulster must treat carefully this week. They will rightly take plenty of confidence in the way they romped to victory, but Treviso surely can’t be this poor again.
