Ulster Team Talk Thread IV... Go On My Henderson...

It’s hard not to feel for the guys! Always punching well above their weight!

Really hate red cards like that, especially when you have 18 stone trucking it at you!

no excuses now not to focus purely on the league and make sure everyone is fresh and raring to go! We’re always going to struggle on two fronts!

I also think some respect needs to be put on Billy Burns' name. He may not be world class or good enough for Ireland, but he's a good player who has had an excellent season and performed very well in big games. Ulster would be in big trouble if he got injured.

It just annoys me when I see people say stuff like "Ulster need a proper 10" or when Luke Fitzgerald is slandering him on his podcast. I think we have this weird thing in Ireland where if a 10 isn't goal kicking, that has an adverse effect on people's perception of them.

Everyone is calling for Ross Byrne to be called back into the Ireland squad, but when both Ross and Burns were in the squad in 2020, Burns performed better.

Still disappointed after Saturday.

When you lose by a point against a side of the quality of Toulouse over 160 minutes it's hard to take, but that's sport.

What could we have done differently? Better discipline would have helped. You have to feel for O'Toole when Herring's intervention was far more dangerous, in fact could have really complained it it was two red cards? Something similar in the Zebo red card on Lowry earlier in the season when I think there was another Munster player involved who could have got red. I'm not sure what the law states there. I'm yet to see two players sent off for the same incident.

Also we turned down one kick at goal early in the second half and kicked to the corner and got no reward. Easy to say now but even at the time I thought that was a questionable decision.

It was the stuff of fine margins so probably doesn't require a deep inquest. We've made massive strides this season.

We have three regular season matches left in the URC, Munster at home, Edinburgh away and the Sharks at home, win all three and we'll finish 2nd and have a home quarter final and potential home semi final. That's got to be the aim and we're good enough to do it.

As it stands we'd be at home to Edinburgh in the Q/F.

Win that and as it stands we'd then be at home to the winner of Glasgow v Sharks.

So you're right we absolutely should be aiming for a place in the final.

Billy Burns and Kieran Treadwell sustained concussions during the Heineken Champions Cup defeat against Toulouse on Saturday. Both players will now follow the Graduated Return to Play protocols.

Either they or the independent medical officer reviewed the footage and took him and he did not play on, that's the system working.

So you could hear what they were saying.....Remarkable.

You have no idea what was being discussed so you rush to your conclusion without one iota of evidence.

We don't get an easy ride - we don't get covered. Ulster fans have been told a million times that we're not a concern - Leinster have a much bigger population, Munster have a grander history and Connacht have a better underdog narrative. ( All great reasons and clearly absolutely more fundamental than "the Southern media don't generally give a toss about a team out who are based primarily in Northern Ireland".)

We've been over this in terms of the RTE coverage, we've been over this in terms of the Northern/Southern split.

There is no greater out-and-out love affair between a province and the media than the coverage of Leinster. There is no more disproportionate and wallowing-in-nostalgia coverage between the media and a province than the reporting on Munster.

That's all she wrote, as they say. If you're right about the treatment of Treadwell (and I haven't watched it back), that's appalling.

But your "Ulster get an easy ride from the media" nonsense is just that - nonsense.

Feck, I thought you were talking nonsense before that gem about Ulster getting an easy ride from the media!

They do - I've recorded Ulster games from RTE. They're not geo-blocked, unlike Ireland 6N games up North, which is very frustrating.

Also, Ulster fans in Cavan (Virginia RFC is growing and really starting to motor), Monaghan and Donegal (Letterkenny RFC has a few lads in the Ulster set-up) aren't payng a licence fee to the Beeb. They're paying one for RTE.