Dave Ewers sees similarities between Exeter Chiefs side that beat Racing 92 in European final and current Ulster squad

​In the Exeter back-row that October day was Dave Ewers, who swapped Sandy Park for Kingspan Stadium this summer and he’s looking forward to locking horns with Racing once again tonight in a crucial Investec Champions Cup game.

Naturally, the Zimbabwean has fond memories of winning the European trophy and still keeps in touch with Witten, who retired from the professional game in the summer to move back home and play club rugby for Instonians.

“It was an awesome experience,” he said. “Ian and Gareth are very close friends of mine and I feel honoured to have played alongside them for so many years and they looked after me.

“I went to watch Ian and his brothers play (for Inst). I was there for his debut game and it was good to see him play with his brothers.

“Winning the European Cup was a very, very special day. I had lost two or three Premiership finals before that against Saracens, so I hadn’t had a good run of finals until that day – it was a massive relief.

“Obviously it was a bit gutting that it was during Covid with no one in the crowd. It was a special day and one that I will never forget.

“It was tough not to celebrate with friends and family at the ground. I’m pretty sure my mum and dad think they are bad luck – whatever final they came to unfortunately we lost and that one was the first one they had missed and we won!

“Then we managed to win the following week against Wasps (in the English Premiership final), so it was a good couple of weeks.”

Ewers sees similarities between the Exeter team that won the trophy three years ago and the current Ulster side.

“Looking back at that team we had some very exciting backs and you can say the same here,” he added. “Across the forwards there were exciting players and we were able to provide them with a good stable platform for them to attack.

“That is something we are aiming to do here as a squad, as a forward pack and one that we are very capable of doing.”

The star-studded Parisians arrive in Belfast also needing a win after they stumbled to defeat in their opening European game against Harlequins.

“They had a disappointing result against Quins at the weekend and just lost,” said Ewers. “I think they are an unbelievable side with threats all over the field and we need to be at our best to beat them.

“I think it is an exciting prospect for us to test ourselves against the best. As players, we want that performance and with a performance the results will come.

“You can see by the way Racing have been scoring their points they are unbelievable at turnovers – once you make a mistake you have to be on high alert as they score a lot of points through that.

“Obviously we don’t want to be making mistakes, but any we make we need to be on high alert to kill their threats.”