The Northern Bank Ulster Schools\u2019 team recovered from their disappointing loss to Leinster Schools a week ago when they travelled to play Connacht Schools\u2019 at the Sportsground in Galway on Wednesday 12th September. The game was played in windy overhead, but good underfoot, conditions.
\nThe Ulster Schools squad had worked hard with the coaching staff as well as having sessions with Brian McLaughlin. The players and management were determined to sort out the problems that had arisen against Leinster Schools\u2019 and their hard work paid off.
\nPlaying with the wind in the first half, Ulster Schools\u2019 took an early 6-0 lead with two penalties from Campbell College full back, Jack Owens. Despite losing key players such as Mark Gilkinson, Andrew McGrath and Mark Lagan to injury in the course of the first period of play, the attacking mind set of the Ulster XV was not disrupted. With Connor Shields displaying great game management skills, the Ulster team continued to control the game in terms of possession and territory. It was Connor who showed his class with a well taken try a well taken try just before the interval to put his team into an 11-0 lead. Jack Owens added the extras to see the Northern Bank Ulster Schools\u2019 team into a relatively comfortable 13-0 half time lead.
\nPlaying with the wind the Connacht XV started the second half strongly and took play deep into Ulster territory. However, they found the Ulster defence to be well-organised and determined not to concede any points. The Ulster Schools\u2019 team weathered the storm and went on to score two second half tries. The first of these came from Connor Shields and the second came from the blistering pace of Rory Campbell who outpaced the home defence to run his try in from sixty metres. Neither try was converted but it was the Northern Bank Ulster Schools\u2019 team that celebrated at the final whistle with their hard earned but well-deserved 23-0 victory.
\nThe Ulster Schools\u2019 team will now prepare for their only home fixture of the Schools\u2019 Inter Provincial series when they take on the might of Munster Schools at Ravenhill on Saturday 22nd September.
\nNorthern Bank Ulster Schools\u2019 team:-
\n15. Jack Owens (Campbell College)
\n14. Thomas Gaston (Ballymena Academy)
\n13. John McClure (RBAI)
\n12. Rory Bell (RBAI)
\n11. Rory Campbell (RBAI)
\n10. Conor Shiels (Coleraine AI)
\n9. Josh Fullerton (Campbell College)
\n1. Michael Lagan (Methodist College)
\n2. Max Montgomery (Bangor GS)
\n3. Aaron Gilkinson (Wallace HS)
\n4. Lewis Benson (Belfast HS)
\n5. Thomas Donnan (Down HS)
\n6. Daniel Dass (BRA)
\n7. Andrew McGrath (RBAI)
\n8. Daryl Morton (Captain, RS Armagh)
\nReplacements:
\n16. Andrew Shaw (Bangor GS)
\n17. Rory Squires (Limavady GS)
\n18. Conor McIlmurray (Campbell College)
\n19. Alexander Thompson (Methodist College)
\n20. James Gallagher (Methodist College)
\n21. Peter Kidd (Coleraine AI)
\n22. James McCallan (Wallace HS)
\n23. Connor McKee (Methodist College)
\nCoaches: Richard Hedley and John Andrews
\nUlster Rugby Coach: Brian McLaughlin
\nStrength and conditioning coach: Chris Shields
\nDoctor: Dr Gavin McLean
\nPhysiotherapist: Andrew McMullan
\nManager: Richard Clingan<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The Northern Bank Ulster Schools\u2019 team recovered from their disappointing loss to Leinster Schools a week ago when they travelled to play Connacht Schools\u2019 at the Sportsground in Galway on Wednesday 12th September. The game was played in windy overhead, but good underfoot, conditions. The Ulster Schools squad had worked hard with the coaching staff […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":5,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[229],"tags":[3959,17213,1997],"class_list":["post-32238","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-schools","tag-rugby","tag-schools","tag-ulster"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32238","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/5"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=32238"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32238\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":32241,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/32238\/revisions\/32241"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=32238"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=32238"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.intouchrugby.com\/magazine\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=32238"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}