Scarlets looking to continue winning form in Ulster

In the only RaboDirect PRO12 fixture of the weekend the Scarlets will take on third placed Ulster as the West Wales region looks to climb the table and edge ever closer to the top four play-off spot.

Emyr Phillips and Samson Lee have today been released back to the Scarlets from Wales; the two front row players will travel to Belfast tomorrow morning, Friday, and will take their place on the replacements bench for the clash against Ulster.

The West Wales region will be hoping to secure a second victory over the Irish province having already taken the spoils against Ulster at Parc y Scarlets when the two sides met in November.

In that 17-9 victory Scarlets’ spark refused to be dampened despite the conditions, with the West Wales side enjoying sustained periods of pressure and putting together strong phases of play on the Ulster line – securing the majority of possession and territory.

Looking back to the victory over Ulster at the Parc Head Coach Simon Easterby said: “The conditions weren’t great but we played the weather well. We out muscled them in some respects and that was a good performance from us. Set a bit of a template on how to play against Ulster who are at the moment playing really well.

“We’ll have to be at that sort of level again to go to Ulster and secure a performance and a result. It hasn’t always been happy hunting ground for us in recent years.”

Head Coach Simon Easterby as made three changes to the starting XV that fronted up and secured an 18-13 victory over Munster at Parc y Scarlets earlier in the month with Gareth Maule returning to outside centre and Kirby Myhill and Jacobie Adriaanse packing down at front row alongside experienced loosehead prop Phil John.

It’ll also be an historic evening for Scarlets’ South African second row duo George Earle and Johan Snyman as they both make their 50th regional appearance in what is a must win clash against Ulster.

With three wins from three in the RaboDirect PRO12 in recent weeks Easterby went on to say that the squad has been buoyed by the recent victories and has given themselves the best chance in the final stages of the season, he said: “The players are really confident with three wins on the trot. We have everything to play for. We’ve put ourselves in a bit of a difficult position in terms of the top four but we feel pretty confident at the moment with the run-in that we’ve got that we can go to places like Ulster and Glasgow and get the wins.”

With only ten points separating the Scarlets and the Ospreys, who are currently in fourth position, the Scarlets have it all to play having already secured 13 points from 15 in the last three rounds.

Easterby went on to say: “An early season inconsistency prevented us from getting closer to the top four. We collected five losing bonus points in games that we really should have won. We’ve started to win those games now and we’ve had three wins on the bounce; we still have 7 games and 35 points up for grabs.”

Scarlets team v Ulster, Friday 14th March kick-off 7.05pm at Ravenhill:

15 Jordan Williams, 14 Kristian Phillips, 13 Gareth Maule, 12 Olly Barkley, 11 Frazier Climo, 10 Aled Thomas, 9 Gareth Davies, 1 Phil John, 2 Kirby Myhill, 3 Jacobie Adriaanse, 4 George Earle, 5 Johan Snyman, 6 Josh Turnbull, 7 John Barclay, 8 Rob McCusker ©

Replacements: Emyr Phillips, Rob Evans, Samson Lee, Richard Kelly, Sione Timani, Aled Davies, Josh Lewis, Adam Warren.