IF EVER THERE was a game that epitomised Connacht’s Jekyll and Hyde syndrome, it was their own Scottish horror in Round 4 of last season’s URC.

Connacht, on the back of three home victories to start the season, fought back from 14-3 down to trail only 17-15 against Edinburgh in the third quarter. Having seized control of the game at The Hive, they looked well positioned to earn their fourth win on the spin. And then they turned their backs on Ben Vellacott on a penalty just outside their own five-metre line — a habit typically coached out of a rugby player at U8s level — and were consequently powerless to prevent Mark Bennett from stretching Edinburgh’s lead.

It appeared, though, that Connacht wouldn’t be denied: Cian Prendergast’s converted try in the 76th minute brought them level once more.

Connacht, though, actually were denied: they ceded momentum once more and Ben Healy’s last-play drop-goal won it for the hosts.

Pete Wilkins, breaking character, was unabashedly furious, particularly with his side’s lapse in concentration for the Bennett score.

This had been Connacht distilled, though: brilliant and terrible and electrifying and mystifying, and utterly infuriating in their ability to find a way to lose a squeaker.

You can survive the rest but that last trait will ultimately tank your season. Of their nine URC defeats last season, Connacht lost five of them by a single score. They missed out on the play-offs by five points.

And so Sam Costellow’s late, lead penalty for the Scarlets in Llanelli last Friday night brought with it a gnawing familiarity. All of Connacht’s promise — both in their opening two games to that point and in a first half at Parc y Scarlets in which they led 14-0 — looked for all the world like another false dawn.

Except on this occasion, it was Connacht who denied their opponent that sweet release at the death. They puffed their chests out. Cathal Forde did his thing. Dr Jekyll pulled it out of the bag.

This was kind of new. Pete Wilkins felt it immediately. His team had effectively flipped on its head one of those five heartbreakers from last season.

“Absolutely, yes”, Wilkins told The 42 earlier this week, “and I referenced it directly to the players in the changing room after the game: I don’t think we would’ve won that game last season, and probably for a couple of reasons.

“I’m not sure we would have had that bedrock of spirit and identity that we’re trying to build in order to drive the intensity we needed to stay in the fight,” Wilkins explained.

“Although we didn’t have the accuracy at times, I think the intensity was important. I thought that was significant in terms of our development, and for it to come so quickly on the back of that Sharks performance where we were able to turn around a big deficit at half-time, that reassures me that we’re moving in the right direction.”

Wilkins did additionally stress that “you don’t want to be doing that every weekend”, which is true enough. But Connacht are most likely going to have to do it again as soon as this weekend in Belfast.

Connacht’s last four meetings with Ulster have been one-score games, with two victories apiece since 2022/23. Last season, a single point separated the sides on aggregate.

This is the ultimate coin-flip match-up and, Croke Park aside, it might even be the more appealing interpro on paper than the Leinster-Munster meeting which precedes it.

Wilkins and Richie Murphy have even engaged in a bit of verbal sparring this week, with the Connacht boss suggesting on Tuesday that Ulster had to some degree shadowboxed against the Bulls in Pretoria last Saturday to preserve themselves for tonight’s encounter at Kingspan Stadium.

Murphy’s response was that “Pete should concentrate on coaching his own team”.

And that much will be put to the test at 8 o’clock tonight, because much of Wilkins’ coaching since pre-season has been centred around his squad’s “consistency of character” — i.e. their ability to come up clutch when the you-know-what hits the fan, just as they did against both the Sharks and the Scarlets.

But how the hell do you improve something so intangible on the training ground?

“There are a few bits to it”, Wilkins explained.

“Partly, it’s on me having greater clarity at the front end in terms of what type of team I’m trying to build and lead, I suppose,” he said.

“The other key bit has been to join up that cultural piece with how we’re playing the game of rugby. One of the big reflections for me last season was I felt we had a pretty clear, comfortable [cultural] framework going into the year, and I felt we had a clear rugby framework, but when those things don’t align totally, you’re almost trying to serve two different masters.

This year we’ve managed to reduce the amount of ideas in the room but align them better. You can be trying to tick too many boxes at once and then you don’t nail anything.

“The boys have responded to that. I think the type of identity, no one is surprised by it: Connacht is built on it, which is hard work and making sure that we fight for every scrap, but also allying that with a fair degree of ambition and positivity in terms of how we go after things.

“Right now, it’s getting a really good response out of the group. Supporters see a team they can relate to.

“There are some really big tests to come and it’ll be exciting to see how that plays out.”

Ulster, incidentally three-point favourites for tonight’s encounter even after their defeats in South Africa, will provide a stern examination of Connacht’s chin at Kingspan.

In reality, it’s not the kind of fixture from which a narrow defeat will blot either side’s copybook to any great extent.

But given that last season’s Belfast meeting made for one of Connacht’s five single-score defeats, victory for the westerners on this occasion would be another valuable addition to the muscle memory, and another step towards banishing Mr Hyde once and for all.