AHEAD OF TAKING the lead of Ulster’s coaching for the briefest of stints, Dan Soper says he is looking forward to welcoming Richie Murphy to Ravenhill in the coming weeks.
After Dan McFarland was relieved of his duties with the northern province last week, Soper was mooted as a potential interim head coach to the end of the campaign but instead it was quickly confirmed that Irish U20s boss Murphy will instead fill such a role upon the conclusion of the underage Six Nations.
Ulster will play just once before then – this Saturday night against the Dragons at Kingspan Stadium – with Soper plugging the gap before Murphy’s arrival.
Having previously held similar roles within Irish Rugby’s structure, Soper says he is looking forward to working closely with the Bray man.
“When I started at Ulster, Richie was in the same role with Ireland as the skills and the kicking coach and so we would have had a bit to do with each other,” Soper recalled.
“Richie is a great guy and, yeah, I’m looking forward to working with him in the coming weeks.
“I think we’ve got a great group of people here and we work really hard. We just need to make it work.”
Initially named head coach on an interim basis, Murphy is now the overwhelming favourite to take on the role permanently unless things go badly wrong in the season’s closing months.
In his sixth season as an assistant, Soper says rivalling Murphy for the top job on the ticket through any recruitment process is not something he has yet considered.
“Would I want the job permanently? Well, it’s not on the table,” he said. “You don’t have to make that decision until someone offers it to you and so I don’t need to make that decision.
“(Any speculation), it’s completely irrelevant. As well as people have their opinions on who it should or shouldn’t be, if I let all that distraction and that noise get in my head, then I can’t do my job as well as I’d like to.”
While that job this week will be a different one, Soper reminds that through his career prior to Ulster it was all he knew.
He came to prominence in 2012 by taking Ballyclare High to their first Ulster Schools’ Cup final in almost 40 years before winning the competition three seasons in succession with RBAI teams that included the likes of James Hume, Mike Lowry and Dave McCann.
Through the same period, he was head coach at Banbridge RFC, guiding them to two All Ireland League promotions.
“Until I came and worked at Ulster, all I’d ever done had been a head coach,” he said. “So actually the transition when I came in here was probably a bigger one because then you’re trying to work out exactly when is it my time to fit in or when do I need to step back.
It comes pretty naturally to me to be in front of the group and be pushing everyone in the same direction.
“So yeah, I’ve enjoyed (it so far) and I’m looking forward to the rest of the week.”
And can we expect to see a markedly different Ulster to the one we have seen recently under McFarland?
“No two people see the game the same, all of us sitting in here will see it slightly differently,” Soper said.
“What I think is important is that in a coaching team that you don’t all see the game the same, so you can challenge each other on why you think something is important.
“So Dan and I agreed on loads and loads of things, and we had differences as well, but I think that’s the same with Jonny (Bell, defence coach) and I or Roddy (Grant, forwards coach) and I. We would all see some things the same and some differently.
“In terms of this weekend, you know in one week I’m not sure Wayne Smith would come in and you would see something massively revolutionary.
I think the clarity that we’re going after this week is exactly what our game looks like and how do we go about putting that on the pitch? Just cutting away a wee bit of stuff around the edges and simplifying things.
“I would hope that our execution will improve this week, but that’s on the whole group. That’s on the coaching staff and that’s on the players and everyone.”
