French side Bordeaux-Begles made it two straight wins in the Champions Cup with a 40-19 victory over Irish province Ulster on Saturday while English champions Northampton stunned South African franchise Bulls in Pretoria.
Bordeaux-Begles, who beat Leicester 42-28 last week, have gained bonus-point wins in both their games in Pool 1. Ulster, the 1999 champions, took their second beating in successive weeks from French opposition, following their 61-21 thrashing in Toulouse.
Japanese international number eight Tevita Tatafu crashed over after two minutes for the visitors at Ravenhill with former Ireland fly-half Joey Carbery adding the conversion.
Ulster hit back with tries for Cormac Izuchukwu and Nick Timoney before giving away a penalty try to make it 14-14. South African wing Werner Kok then sprinted through for a third Ulster to give the hosts the edge at half-time.
The home side held firm until the start of the final quarter when the French visitors finally broke down the walls, running in four tries to close out the victory.
A sweeping move put Damian Penaud over in the corner. Five minutes later the France winger turned provider with a deft inside pass to Argentina lock Guido Petti.
Another France winger Louis Bielle-Biarrey and Ugo Boniface dotted down in the closing minutes to complete a second half that went 26-0 in the French side’s favour.
“We put a huge effort in first half and we ran out of steam a wee bit,” said Ulster assistant coach Dan Soper.
“They had a lot of power come off their bench in the last quarter and we weren’t able to handle that.”
Impressive Saints
Northampton pulled off a remarkable bonus-point victory as they beat Bulls 30-21 at Loftus Versfeld where the 30C heat was in stark contrast to conditions in England.
Saints, who hammered Castres in their opening match last week, were second best in possession and territory, with 70 percent of the match played in their half.
However, they counter-punched superbly to run in four tries in this Pool 3 encounter, two of them by wing Tommy Freeman.
George Hendy broke the deadlock for Saints after 31 minutes but Bulls hit back straight away through Marcell Coetzee.
Alex Mitchell set up Juarno Augustus to give Northampton a 12-7 lead at the break and they extended that immediately afterwards when Freeman went over for his first.
Fin Smith converted and added a penalty before the Bulls struck back with two quick tries or young back-rower Cameron Hanekom, with Johan Goosen converting, to cut the Northampton lead to a single point at 22-21.
Smith, though, converted another penalty before Freeman closed out the win with his second try.
Northampton have a maximum 10 points from their opening two games while Bulls have lost twice to English opposition after stumbling at Saracens a week ago.
