Ulster Rugby: Province still have ‘plenty to work on’ despite six-try win against Dragons

Ulster head coach Richie Murphy felt his side’s opening performance of the United Rugby Championship season was “as you’d expect but probably not as you would like” after a 42-21 win over Dragons on Friday.

The northern province shipped three tries in the win and, despite scoring six of their own, occasionally undermined promising attacking play with errors or breakdown penalties.

Murphy said his side “looked shaky” after conceding just 12 seconds into the game through a score he felt should have been chalked off but was “delighted” to start the campaign with five points in Belfast.

“I thought at times we played some really good rugby [but] probably didn’t finish enough. So plenty to work on there and defensively I thought we looked better at times, but disappointed to concede three tries,” he said.

“It was kind of as you’d expect, but probably not as you would like. We go, we prepare, we come up with these plans in relation to how we’re going to break down the opposition, and you can see a lot of them going right, but then there’s one or two that just go wrong and that’s always going to happen.

“It’s just how you deal with that and how you move on.”

With only one pre-season contest under their belts, Murphy felt his side “looked a little tired” in the second half but said the run-out will be “massive” moving forward as they prepare for next week’s visit to Edinburgh where they were beaten 47-17 to end their disappointing 2024-25 season.

“We came here looking for five points. We started with a really positive win,” he added.

“We go to Edinburgh next week and we have a point to prove over there.”