Ulster's Dan McFarland in warning over threat by 'great ambassador' heading into Kingspan clash with Toulouse

Antoine Dupont broke Ulster’s hearts the last time he was in Belfast during the two-legged round-of-16 clash in April 2022.

Ulster left France with a six-point advantage and looked set for a place in the quarter-finals as they led going into the last minute in the second leg. But a moment of magic from the French scrum half saw him weave through the home defence to score a try and Thomas Ramos’ simple conversion gave Toulouse a one-point victory on aggerate.

“What a great player, what a great ambassador for the sport,” said McFarland. “I remember when he was here the last time, he ruined our night basically on his own with a brilliant display of kicking and a couple of breaks that led to tries.

“I leave the stadium pretty late obviously and going out he was still signing autographs for young Ulster supporters. He could have packed his bag and gone straight back to the team hotel, I thought ‘man, that's awesome’.

“I've got a lot of respect for him, he's a great ambassador for the sport. In terms of his play, he's a very instinctive player that has a brilliant skillset. He's a brilliant athlete, which gets him out of trouble a lot.

“You've got to be on your toes around the breakdown because anything can happen around there. He'll see gaps and take them, but he has the strength to be able to see off tacklers, to offload to enormous forwards or wingers that are playing off him.

“His kicking game is super, you've got to try and get pressure on that because he'll bang the ball out from a ruck five yards from his own line and get in 40 metres from your line. In rugby terms, that's priceless.”

“He's a super player and our guys are fully aware of that. We'll be looking to limit his destructive ability.”

Ulster beat another French side, Racing 92, with a bonus point last time out to get their European campaign back on track after defeat by Bath but McFarland expects Toulouse to be a different proposition.

“It's not that Racing are conservative, but Toulouse are even less conservative than Racing, zero conservatism at times,” he said. “They've a big kicking game...Toulouse will often use their big forwards in the same pattern, playing with Dupont around the edge of the rucks, looking for weaknesses, looking to overpower you with the size of their players, looking for offloads or gaps in between to try and collapse your defence.

“Then they'll whip the ball to the edges with their lightening backs, that maybe used to happen in the olden times but not so much now. If you've got the right personnel, guys who are superb, tall, off-loading players, it's very difficult.”

McFarland believes if Jacob Stockdale puts in a big performance on Saturday night, he’ll be in a strong position to make the Ireland Six Nations squad.

McFarland said: “He's been very focused about what he's trying to achieve.”

He added: “He's had some brilliant counter-attacks, his ability to beat people, put pressure on players. Defensively he's been working very hard, he's got a good left boot.

“Moving forward, I'm not going to second-guess Andy Farrell, but Jacob will know well that it's extremely competitive there. I know Jacob will be desperate to get out in these next couple of games, in the highest arena at club level, to demonstrate that he's the man for that job.”