Ulster Rugby v Ospreys

week was excellent, and then we obviously scored a lot of points in the second game as well.” “There’s a few things we need to tidy up but it’ll definitely come and we’re looking a lot sharper in terms of our set-plays and our edge attack.” Turning his attention to this evening’s opponents Ospreys, Lowry is looking forward to what he expects will be a challenging game. The sole meeting between the sides last season, which saw Lowry donning the number ten shirt for the first time in his senior career, finished as an 8-0 victory for the visitors at Morganstone Brewery Field with a Stuart McCloskey try and a John Cooney penalty the only scores, but the former RBAI schoolboy expects a much more free-flowing game this time round. One intriguing feature of the match will be how Allen Clarke’s side fare with many of their biggest names away on Rugby World Cup duty – influential forwards Alun Wyn Jones, Justin Tipuric, Adam Beard and Nicky Smith, and backs George North, Owen Watkin and Aled Davies are all currently in Japan with Warren Gatland’s squad, while Ulster are bereft of only Iain Henderson and Jacob Stockdale. Lowry, however, refuses to read too much into player absence, insisting the visitors’ strength in depth will make for a highly competitive match-up. “Ospreys are always a difficult side and they’re quite confrontational at times,” he concludes. “They’ve got some big players and they like to hold players up, they’ve got a good kicking game and they have good counter-attacking players so it’ll be an interesting game. Obviously, weather- dependent, hopefully it’ll be a nice open game as well.”

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