HAVING TO TOLERATE the outside noise is something that any Ulster head coach has to become outrageously gifted at, in an instant.
But comments from Connacht’s head coach Pete Wilkins about Ulster’s approach to the two recent defeats in South Africa teased a response from Richie Murphy at yesterday’s press conference ahead of Saturday night’s home URC fixture against Connacht (kick-off 8pm).
“I’m not sure Ulster’s performances in South Africa will worry them too much,” said Wilkins.
“And the reason I say that is I reckon they probably picked that side against the Bulls with Connacht in mind on the other side of it.
“There were some important players who either weren’t playing or were coming off the bench or were subbed earlier.”
Murphy answered back that he had “no response” before adding, “Pete should concentrate on coaching his own team.”
Nor will Murphy take much heed of what is said on planet punditry. Stephen Ferris has never been afraid to lower the blade on his former team, and his remark to RTÉ that Ulster are “a nice team to play against” will not be going up on the dressing room wall.
“Are we too nice to play against? Well, maybe we are. But it’s not Stephen Ferris’ opinion we are going to go on. It’s the opinions from within the group,” said Murphy.
“There’s certain aspects of our game that we are going after and to make them better, aesthetically when you are looking at it from outside, it will make it look different.
“But if you just want to be nasty, you can’t do the things you used to do years ago. I’m not sure the context of that comment, but our job is to improve Ulster Rugby and make us a competitive team at the top end of that league and there’s certain elements that will go into that. And toughness is part of that.”
Defeats to Lions and Bulls in their mini-tour of South Africa is hardly the stuff to have them panicking this early in the season. But Ulster have an experience deficit in their pack that has been remorselessly punished of late after they opened their season with a win over Glasgow.
Lions beat them 35-22 and Bulls ran in a 47-21 win. Of the two, Murphy was actually more pleased with the Bulls performance as they ‘got a few shots off.’
But both games showed how they could be bullied.
“Last week, obviously Bulls had us under a lot of pressure in that set piece around the scrum,” Murphy said.
“Corrie Barrett was on three caps, James (McCormick) was on his third cap, first start, Charlie Irvine got his first taste of senior rugby in probably one of the toughest places in the world against a scrum that we are probably not expecting to face.
“But that’s the way it goes. I wouldn’t have changed our selection based on what they done.”
Fixing scrum issues has been tempered by lack of preparation time this week. Ulster landed back in Belfast at 9am on Monday with the players given the rest of that day off.
When they came in on Tuesday, it was a case of looking back with a review, and then zoning in on Connacht.
Today is a rest day to charge up the batteries and then they have a captain’s run tomorrow.
It’s not lost on Murphy that they had Barrett and McCormick in the front row on three caps each, but alongside them Andy Warwick will reach 200 caps if he plays on Saturday. They also have Iain Henderson close by.
The young lads are “going to have to learn quick,” says Murphy.
“We don’t have a situation where we can play the same props every week. They are going to have to come through.”
On the scrum issues, he hailed the Bulls scrum as the world’s best.
“It’s definitely something technical which I have worked on with the guys because that’s what scrummaging is about.
“But we went into a scrum, the loosehead was 128 kilos and the tighthead was 143 kilos.
“Our tighthead is 118 kilos. So even that mass alone, without the technical side of it, coming down on top of you is quite difficult to deal with and let’s be honest, that Bulls scrum is probably the strongest scrum in the world.
“There’s probably a couple of teams in France that might disagree with that, but it is a formidable pack of forwards to play against. We had a very inexperienced team out in the end.
“We have obviously lost Marty (Moore) who was our big scrummaging tighthead. And there’s no substitute for that, directly at the moment. The props that are around, we have Tom O’Toole, but most of our props are young and inexperienced at this level.
“So how do you get experience? You play. We have to build that game base so that between now and Christmas, these players are more comfortable at the level they are playing at. They are learning on the job which is very difficult.”
Talk about difficult. Murphy is in the unique position of trying to exploit the weaknesses of his own son, Ben, who has opened the season well for Connacht with three tries so far.
On Tuesday night, he and his wife were out enjoying a game of padel and Ben called. Banter ensued.
“He’s not telling me much, he’s not telling his mum much either, which is surprising,” Murphy said with tongue in cheek.
“So we are not getting any information out of Connacht. He is very loyal to his team.”
