Ulster captain Alan O'Connor unable to mask disappointent after shock quarter-final defeat in United Rugby Championship

Ulster were knocked out at the quarter-final stage after slumping to defeat against Connacht in front of their home fans at Kingspan Stadium on Friday.

Again, Ulster failed to get over the line in a big knockout game with a huge incentive on the line. The same scenario unfolded last season when Dan McFarland’s side led the Stormers deep into injury time in the semi-final with a final in Belfast on the line, but still lost.

Against Connacht the prize for victory was a home semi-final and the knowledge that Ulster would not have to travel outside Ireland during the knockout phase.

In truth the 15-10 scoreline flattered Ulster, who once again had an over-reliance on their maul which produced one try, but for the most part Connacht nullified the threat, with the home side offering very little else in attack.

Connacht weren’t much better in an attacking regard, butchering a number of try-scoring opportunities, but Jack Carty’s five penalties off the kicking tee was enough to put the western province into the last four.

"If we had stolen that at the end it would have been a robbery, in my opinion, in terms of how we went about it and how we went about the discipline,” said O’Connor.

“It’s very disappointing, it’s a game of rugby and Connacht came up and they done us at the breakdown. We gave away 18 penalties, I don't know how many they gave away, but it definitely felt like less than half of that.

“You can't really do that in a game of rugby, how do you expect to win a game of rugby when you do that? They did a very good job on the breakdown.

“At the end of the day we came off second best to a very hungry Connacht side who came up here with guns blazing,” added O’Connor, who said Ulster’s late attempt to make amends was a case of too little, too late.

“We weren’t good at the breakdown – that won them the game and lost us the game.

“We got on the wrong side of the referee pretty early on and we just compounded that the whole game.

“We did well at the end to throw the kitchen sink a few times but then their was a penalty, or a bit of ill-discipline from us at the breakdown. It’s disappointing.”

It was another season that promised much for Ulster but ended in failure and O’Connor accepts that McFarland’s side allowed too many games to slip through their grasp.

“Finishing second was a good achievement but there were plenty of points during the season that we let slip as well and we should have had definitely more in the bank,” he said.

“European rugby we were very lucky and fortunate to get into the last 16- as a whole I thought we played some really good stuff. Our set piece work was good but at the end of the day we lost a knockout game.

“They were plenty of games that we should have done better in throughout the year but overall we played some good stuff.”