Herring opts for positivity as Ulster prepare for La Rochelle

Ulster hooker Rob Herring is trying to stay positive ahead of his side’s clash with reigning champions La Rochelle this weekend at Stade Marcel – Deflandre.

Ulster’s 2022-23 campaign has not been a positive one thus far as they fell heavily to Sale Sharks in Round 1 (39-0) before losing out to La Rochelle a week later (36-29).

“We have to flip the switch,” Herring told the Belfast Telegraph.

“If you look at the last La Rochelle game we let them get ahead in the first half and in the second half we won the scoreboard so we have to take that and build on it.

“There have been things in the last two games that have been in our control which we haven’t handled well so if we can just get those moments right, we are still a good side, we play good rugby and we have a lot of heart.

“We’ll look to draw on all that.”

Ulster have been forced to deal with a large dose of misfortune over the past fortnight with narrow losses to both Munster and Benetton.

“These are tough losses for us,” Herring said.

“We are gutted. We are just on a run of bad losses or bad form at the moment.

“It’s the same as Munster, if the game finishes five minutes earlier we are coming in on Monday a bit happier but sometimes things just don’t go your way.

“Credit to Benetton they played really well, they forced some errors into us and they capitalised on them.”

Despite the results, Herring was keen to salvage whatever positivity he could.

“We were 13 points down (against Benetton) and they had all the momentum and we were able to get back into the game and go ahead with five minutes left,” he said.

“We can always look at that as a positive, there are things in our control that we aren’t getting right, and I think if we starting nailing those moments then it starts to look like a different performance.

“It was a good battle to the end and we could have snuck it even though we are not playing our best rugby at the moment.”