Rob Herring ready for Ulster return in Dublin

Ulster face Connacht in the Pro14 - their first outing since beating the Cheetahs on February 22 - and with social distancing guidelines still in place the 52,000-capacity Dublin stadium will be devoid of his usual atmosphere.

“It’s going to be slightly different, but I think in terms of our team mentality it’s something we’ve probably worked on the last couple of seasons,” said Herring. “When we go away to stadiums that don’t have the same atmosphere as the Kingspan, as a group we had to get better at that and in the last two or three years we’ve put an emphasis on creating our own atmosphere on the pitch.

“Whether it’s at Clermont, where it’s absolutely buzzing, or somewhere there’s less of a crowd, it’s about framing it like that.

“This isn’t a pre-season game for us and we can’t work our way into it.

“We know if we win this game we’re into a semi-final.

“So there’s obviously a massive importance on that.

“We’re not training to ease our way into a season, we’re training to start with a bang.

“It’s a big test, but it’s a good challenge as well, it’s all probably mental at the end of the day.

“Physically we’ll be in a good place and it’ll be a good test for us to see where we are mentally.

“If we want to be challenging for big championships at the end of a season, these are the things we’ve just got to get on with.”

After a difficult six months Herring is looking forward to getting back on the pitch in a competitive game.

“There’s been a lot of good work put in by all our support staff, the guys around the programme, and I’m pretty confident we’re in a good place to get back into some rugby,” he said. “There have been challenges.

“But everyone else is in the same boat, not just rugby players, it has been a tough time.”

“I guess we make the most of it as a rugby player because you don’t get the opportunity to rest the body up and almost refresh like this.

“It has been a good opportunity to have that mental space, sort out any niggles.

“It has been tough and staying connected is one of our big things as a squad and not being able to see your mates every day has been tough.

“But in the bigger scheme of things it’s a small thing to overcome and I’m glad to be back and doing what we love doing.

“There is light at the end of the tunnel and in under a week we’ll be playing our first game, so it’s pretty exciting.”

One of the biggest challenges getting back to training was scrummaging.

“The first few weeks there was no contact, I think it was the first three or four weeks,” said Herring. “We’re scrummaging at the moment and we have to get our exit when we play a live game, at the same time it’s kept to a minimum, so good quality reps instead of spending 45 minutes in that position.”

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