Cardiff Blues can be proud of the way they stood up to the physical challenge against Ulster, according to John Mulvihill.
Rey Lee-Lo scored a first half try, but despite a gutsy performance from the home side, Ulster snatched the victory thanks to a Michael Lowry try and the boot of Irish international John Cooney.
The head coach was frustrated with his side’s unforced errors, but is confident they bounce back with a strong performance against Edinburgh next week.
“It was very frustrating as it was one that got away. They threw everything they had at us and we held them out,” said Mulvihill.
“It was just a couple of individual errors and a bit of decision making, while a penalty count of 12 to one at half time doesn’t give you the opportunity to mount enough pressure.
“We only gave away three penalties in the second half but we did spill the ball two meters from the try line because we didn’t show patience in that area.
“To put it into context, they finished the game with a fully international pack, while we have kids who are just stepping up having played only a handful of games so far, and some of them making their debuts over the last couple of weeks.
“It was a credit to our boys who stood up physically tonight, we weren’t bullied around the pitch, but they finished with a little bit of quality and precision in areas that we didn’t.
“We’ve improved over the last couple of seasons and we’re assure in attack and defence.
“We’re using the ball a lot better when we have it at the right areas of the pitch, but we probably over-played a little bit today with 15 or 20 minutes to go. We still had to pin them down at their end.
“We’ll look back at that period of time where we lost our way and leaders on the pitch we also need to sort out.
“Edinburgh will be tough again next week. They have a few players away on international duty but they also have 11 foreigners at the club who can step up into the fray.
“They’re a team that, if we make too many individual and unforced errors, they will punish us with a good scrum, a good line-out and they move the ball well. They’re well coached.
“We’re under no illusions about the challenge but we’ll go up there and put in a good performance. We won there two years ago after being down 17-0 at half time.
“We know we can do it and we’ll put the detail onto that in the week and see if we can go up there and get the result.”
The second half was perhaps over-shadowed by an injury to Rey Lee-Lo, who was stretchered off the field following a lengthy treatment by the region’s medical team.
James Botham was also forced off in the first half, but there was reasons to cheer as Owen Lane made a long awaited comeback, making his first appearance since January.
Mulvihill welcomed the wing’s return to action and gave an update on Lee-Lo and Botham’s progress.
“He’s up, he’s in the changing room and he’s fine. He was knocked out for a very short period of time after his head collided with an opponent’s hip in a tackle,” explained the Australian.
“But they only put him on the board because he was out for 10 or 20 seconds but he’s fine now.
“He’ll go through the protocols and will probably have a few weeks off.
“James Botham had a bit of an AC complaint but there were a few boys who were banged up a bit.
“That was a big, physical team that we played against so they’ll have the next couple of days off to get themselves right.
“He will probably be doubtful for next week but as a young guy you were always going to give him three or four games before a rest period to rotate, because we have some good back rowers here.
“It was good to see Owen Lane back out there and getting some touches, but unfortunately he just couldn’t get on the end of a winning try for us tonight.”