Matty Rea hoping Ulster can find consistency ahead of European Rugby Champions Cup opener against Bath

Dan McFarland’s side have won four and lost three of their seven United Rugby Championship matches to date and travel to the Rec sitting seventh in the table after back-to-back loses against Glasgow and Edinburgh.

While it is not a crisis, everyone at Kingspan Stadium will want to avoid the slump Ulster suffered around the festive period last year when they lost six out of seven games.

Having lost their last two, Ulster face a crucial run of six fixtures starting at the side second in the English Premiership before facing Racing 92 – the leaders in France’s Top 14.

Irish derbies follow against Connacht and Leinster before resuming in Europe against Toulouse and Harlequins.

"I think as you get older you realise you can’t go up and down with the ebbs and flows of it – you’ve got to be true to your preparation and control what you can control,” said Rea. “All we can control is what we put out on the pitch at training and the approach and intent we bring to training to our preparation, off the field as well, and the rest of it happens on the weekend.

“We put ourselves in the best position to go out there and deliver.

“There were a few honest conversations, a few hard conversations and things where we probably need to look at ourselves and look at what we’re delivering, and I guess assess if that’s what we think is good enough.

“A lot of it is to do with self-awareness from players and guys who have been in this for long enough now stepping up and realising that ‘this wasn’t good enough, that’s not good enough. I can help with this and drive standards’.”

“The leadership group we have now and the older guys, a lot of it is very much player led and I guess that’s a good way to be – it’s how we want to be as a group. You want to be driving standards internally rather than having the coaches on top of you all the time.

“For the weekend as an example, we the players are disappointed, and the coaches are obviously too. They don’t need to tell us – we obviously realise.

“We talk about it, just about being in the game every moment and as much as we can bring to those 80 minutes and once you get ahead you’ve got to look at the next opportunity to put pressure on.

"You can’t rest on your laurels I guess, not that we do, but you’ve got to be so focused, especially against quality opposition keeping the pressure on top of them and suffocating them.”

Rea was part of the last Ulster team to win at Bath in 2019.

“It kind of helps in that we know what it will be like and what they will bring,” he added. “They’ll not change their identity – they are a club with a lot of heritage, a lot of pride and that doesn’t change.

“We know we’re going to go there and expect a tough battle.

“They’re going to be a big physical pack like all English teams.

“They have some dangerous backs and Finn Russell is there and he can pull a bit of magic out of the hat.

“I think they’re top of the league in turnovers so it’s a massive focus for us.”