HEINEKEN CUP Pool Six Stade Francais: (9) 30: Tries: Blin, Sowerby, Bergamasco Cons: Skrela 3 Pens: Skrela 3 Ulster: (3) 10: Tries: Bowe Cons: Humphreys Pen: Humphreys Att: 10,900

The runaway Pool Six leaders scored tries through skipper Mathieu Blin, Shaun Sowerby and Mirco Bergamasco with David Skrela kicking 15 points.

Ulster, out-gunned up front, were resurgent late in the game and made the home side fight for every point.

David Humphreys kicked a penalty and converted a great try by Tommy Bowe.

It was all one-way traffic at the start with Ulster's porous defence allowing the Stade threequarters to cut through the midfield on three occasions.

But the Irish province did a great piece of scrambling to keep their try-line intact with Bowe and Kieran Campbell mopping up.

Ulster's line-out was also malfunctioning and a plethora of unforced errors gave Stade the chance to keep up the pressure up in their opponent's half.

Remarkably, Ulster were still in contention midway through the half with Humphreys cancelling out an early Skrela penalty with a 45-metre effort.

Stade fly-half Skrela was not having much early success with the boot, but he connected with two short-range efforts as the Frenchmen went in at half-time wondering why they were not more than 9-3 ahead.

Ulster's Tommy Bowe scored a great try in the second half

Stade came out determined to rub home their forward domination and within two minutes had scored the first try of the game.

Two massive rumbles up field gave them territorial position and the Stade pack careered over from a line-out with hooker Blin touching down.

Stade's second try in the 56th minute was a carbon copy of the first with the pack driving number eight Sowerby over from five metres.

The floodgates opened again in the 65th minute when Brian Liebenberg burst through, and after a series of rucks, winger Bergamasco was given a free run into the corner.

But Ulster caught Stade with a great reposte two minutes later when Humphreys put up a dangling kick to the corner for Bowe to leap and collect and run around under the posts.

Ulster, showing more self belief, were enjoying their best period in the final 15 minutes when both Humphreys, Scott Young and replacement Paul Steinmetz cut through to almost set up tries.

In the end Ulster held their line intact and deserve some credit in stopping Stade claiming their third bonus point on the trot.

Stade Francais: Dominici; Bergamasco, Glas, Liebenberg, Poulain; Skrela, Fillol; Roncero, Blin, Lemoine, Brouzet, James, Jechoux, Rabadan, Sowerby.
Replacements: Castola, Montes, Marchois, Auradou, Sarramea, Quesada, Mahe.

Ulster: Cunningham; S Young; Bell; Maggs, Bowe; Humphreys, Campbell; McCormack, Shields, Moore, Frost, McCullough, Feather, Best, Wilson.
Replacements: Brady, B Young, Longwell, Barker, Doak, Larkin, Steinmetz.

Referee: D Pearson (RFU).