Ulster Rugby v Dragons

QUESTION TIME WITH TOMMY BOWE

We spoke to the two-time British and Irish Lion to get his thoughts on Ulster’s start to the season, the challenge posed by the Dragons and how he is managing to juggle his family commitments with his other great love, rugby.

Les Kiss and Dwayne Peel came to me with the idea of playing at 13. I had played a lot of 13 over in Wales and on a few occasions for Ulster and I enjoy the challenge - you get a little bit more involved and you get your hands on the ball a little bit more. We have such strength and depth throughout the backline meaning the competition is so fierce while the option of being able to play on the wing and centre is a good asset to the squad. We saw some nice pictures of you with your wife and baby daughter after the game on Friday night. How are you juggling those new family commitments with your rugby? Emma has been at 1 or 2 of the matches. It does get her out of her rhythm but she seems to be enjoying it and isn’t kicking off too much. She is six months old now, so she’s getting big. She’s a lot more alert and smiling, which makes it a lot more fun to come home to as opposed to the early months when it was very difficult not getting much sleep. I found those initial months difficult, the training and pre-season was tough, meaning I was coming home very tired and poor Lucy was having to do the majority of the work. But now the matches have started, we’ve found our routine, I’ve a little bit more free time at the weekends so I am enjoying the opportunity to help out more. Tonight, we face the Dragons at Kingspan Stadium, what sort of challenge do you think they’ll pose? The Dragons will be difficult. They’re always a difficult team to come up against. They have a lot of young guys coming through who are playing some great rugby at the minute so there are a lot of fellas that we’re going to have to keep an eye on but to be playing at home again is something we are up for. The team love playing in front of the home crowd. The atmosphere at the last two home matches has just been unbelievable and we hope that we can keep putting on a good show for the crowd, to deliver high class rugby to keep them coming back and standing up for the Ulstermen.

With three wins from three in the opening PRO14 games, how does the team feel about the start to the season? We’re delighted. Obviously, a winning start is very important and we’ve been playing some good rugby. There is still a lot to work on but we are all really enjoying it. Pre-season went well, we put in a lot of hard work and hopefully we will continue to see the rewards of that work. To have beaten last year’s champions, the Scarlets, at home was a great win for us and something that we’ll keep trying to build on over the next few weeks Looking back at the Scarlets game in particular - it wasn’t the perfect performance, but the team showed tremendous fight to grind out the win against a quality opposition? It was always going to be a difficult match against the Scarlets. They are a team on form and as I said, last season’s title winners. The game highlighted what we need to work on but I think that the fact that we went behind twice in the game to then come back and win shows the fight within the squad. Mentally the squad are in a great place, there’s huge belief within the team and hopefully we can spring board on from that. We know there will be bigger games to come so we’ll learn from last weekend, grow from there and be ready for those bigger games when they come. You’re getting plenty of game time under your belt now. How are you enjoying being injury free? I broke my fibula in March during the Six Nations so to miss the end of the season was very frustrating. But I’ve had a really good pre-season, I’m really enjoying my rugby and hope to get more game time over the next couple of weeks. I’m in a good place at the minute, the body feels good and I’m just focusing on enjoying my rugby - that’s what it’s about. Ulster supporters would be more used to seeing you playing on the wing, but you’ve started 2 of the 3 games of the new season at centre. Firstly, how did that come about, and secondly, how are you enjoying the fresh challenge?

TOMMY BOWE

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