Marty Moore’s relishing Ulster rest boost before Munster test

The tight head, capped 10 times by Ireland, has started eight of Ulster’s 11 games this season and benched in two others.

Moore will again don the No3 shirt when Munster visit Kingspan Stadium tomorrow night and he took full advantage of the nine-day turnaround between the two festive Irish derbies.

“Definitely it was a bonus with the schedule falling in our favour that we had a little bit of extra time in the rest period,” said Moore. “I think this is the longest break I’ve had as a professional over the Christmas period, having the three days in a row, so I think it will be the world of good.

“We came on Tuesday and had a bit of a reset and will get the bodies working again and have a good long week of training.”

Moore did the full 80 minutes when the sides met earlier in the season at Thomond Park.

And with former British Lions prop Graham Rowntree coaching Munster, the Ulster front rower is expecting a tough battle at the coal face.

“There haven’t been a lot of differences (Munster scrum) as there are a lot of the same personnel,” he said. “But they seem to cause teams trouble most weeks so they are definitely one of the teams you pay a bit more attention to and spend a bit more time preparing for that facet of the game.

“I know the guys we’re likely to come up against pretty well at this stage so we’ll see what we can do.

“My focus will be on studying (Dave) Kilcoyne and (Jeremy) Loughman as they are their frontline guys.

"But we’ll have to look across the board and expect anything really and then make adjustments after their team announcement.”

Ulster edged the game in Limerick 15-14 but Moore isn’t taking much from that clash at the end of October.

“The biggest thing with Munster is that it’s always a battle, same as every other week but more so a battle at the breakdown and set-piece,” he said. “But especially the breakdown and securing clean ball.

"And I think it’s something we did in parts against Connacht but it could have been a little bit cleaner in periods of the game.

"But I think it’s just controlling that territory and holding on to the ball against Munster.

“They’ve increased their style of play under (Mike) Prendergast and seem to chuck the ball around a lot more.

"They are dangerous and probably don’t get credit for that at times.

“They have a very good attack.

"So keeping the ball will be massively important and how we manage the game.

“We need to take our chances, whether it be at a lineout maul or any of those strengths of ours.

“We get into the 22 and you see Leinster being very successful with their stuff in tight, their five-metre tap-and-go (at Munster).

"And we want make sure we’re getting into that part of the field as they are a dangerous team.

"And we don’t want to be messing around in midfield.”

Ulster team v Munster (January 1, Kingspan Stadium, 5.15pm): Stewart Moore, Rob Baloucoune, James Hume, Stuart McCloskey, Jacob Stockdale, Billy Burns, John Cooney, Rory Sutherland, Tom Stewart, Marty Moore, Kieran Treadwell, Iain Henderson (capt), Greg Jones, Sean Reffell, Duane Vermeulen.

Replacements: John Andrew, Eric O’Sullivan, Gareth Milasinovich, Sam Carter, Jordi Murphy, Nathan Doak, Jake Flannery, Ethan McIlroy.