LEINSTER broke Ulster hearts in a major final for the second successive year when they added the RaboDirect PRO12 title to the Amlin Challenge Cup with a display of stern efficiency in Dublin yesterday.

For the Ravenhill side, beaten by the same opponents in the 2012 Heineken Cup final, it was a desperately sad end to a season that started amid tragedy last September when Nevin Spence, their promising young centre, lost his life in an accident at his family farm.

That backdrop has added poignancy and a powerful motivation to almost everything they have done since, but you can only get so far on emotion and yesterday it wasn't far enough.

Springbok scrum-half Ruan Pienaar put in a superb display – all Ulster's points came from the six penalties he kicked – but they did not get enough from their other big names.

Rory Best, who looks destined to join the Lions tour to Australia after Dylan Hartley's rush of blood at Twickenham, had a solid afternoon, but Nick Williams, the PRO12 player of the season, only brought his massive bulk to bear in the closing minutes.

In any case, Leinster had emotions of their own to deal with. This was the last outing for Jonny Sexton and Isa Nacewa, while Joe Schmidt will also be taking his leave as he picks up the reins of the Ireland national team. On top of which, having finished as runners-up in the last three PRO12 competitions, Leinster's determination not to fall at the last again was almost palpable.

Officially, Ulster were the home team, by dint of finishing higher up the table at the end of the regular season. In reality, of course, the advantage was to Leinster, their Dublin fans drowning out the sizeable Ulster contingent long before the teams took the pitch. And when the game did get going, so too did the locals' tonsils, cranking up the decibels and only occasionally letting the noise levels drop over the next 80 minutes.

The contest was only three minutes old when Leinster made their first emphatic statement of intent. You would think Ulster might have clocked the fact Leinster have a decent maul when they used it so effectively in the semi-final against Glasgow, but the men from the north were left strewn in their opponents' wake as the Leinster forwards gathered line-out possession, engaged drive and thrust Shane Jennings over for a try.

Sexton's conversion and a penalty three minutes later moved the scoreline along to 10-0, and at that stage it seemed that Ulster's indiscipline would be the story of the game. A succession of offences led to an early general warning, although the penalty count was levelled up towards the finish as Leinster, ever streetwise, were not overly concerned with legal niceties as they tried to quell Ulster's late, desperate fightback.

Ulster might have made more of a match of it had Robbie Diack managed to twist round and ground the ball after surging over in the 17th minute, but he was held up brilliantly by a tackle from Sexton and won nothing more than a scrum for his efforts.

That episode spoke of Leinster's determination, but it also sounded alarm bells among their supporters. So, too, did Pienaar's accuracy, the South African clipping over two penalties before half-time, although Sexton claimed a couple himself to take the interval scoreline to 16-6. Sexton stretched it with another kick five minutes after the break, but then the Ulster fightback began in earnest. Nacewa was yellow-carded for a high and cynical tackle on Paddy Jackson – the suspicion was it might have been red had it not been his last game – and Pienaar added three more penalties while Leinster were short-handed.

However, Ulster had also lost Diack to the sin bin a few minutes earlier, so the advantage was not exactly clear-cut. The game took a critical swing towards Leinster with 13 minutes left. Ulster had most of the pressure by that stage, but Leinster showed they were by far the better side in the red zone when, on a rare excursion into Ulster's 22, they pounded away at the line through a couple of rucks and sent thrust Jamie Heaslip over for their second try.

One more Pienaar penalty was all Ulster could manage after that. In critical positions, they lacked composure and butchered a couple of late chances. As the crowd counted down the last few seconds, Brian O'Driscoll whipped the ball away from a ruck, hammered it into the stand and Leinster had the title they craved.