Connacht vs Ulster: ‘A sideshow for my wife’ – Ulster boss Murphy on sons facing each other

After Richie’s appointment as Ulster boss earlier this year, Jack left the Leinster academy to follow his father to Belfast and made his first appearance on Friday when he replaced the injured Stuart McCloskey.

During the Munster game, Jack kicked to the corner instead of going for goal and potentially earning Ulster a draw in a game they ultimately lost 22-19.

“Jack, unfortunately for him, I’m probably more hard on him because he’s right here in front of my face,” added Murphy.

“It’s difficult for both of us. It’s difficult to pick your son at 20 years of age but difficult for him because of the last couple of weeks in training, he’d been doing really well and hadn’t been getting picked.

“He came on, I think James [Humphreys] has done well in the cameos he’s had. Aidan [Morgan] has started all of our games up to this point.

“We’re in a situation where we have three young 10s and we want to make sure we get the best out of the three of them.”

While Ulster are without injured centre Stuart McCloskey for Saturday’s game, Ireland trio Cormac Izuchukwu, Nick Timoney and Iain Henderson have all resumed team training ahead of Saturday’s game.

Ulster sit 11th in the URC table, one place below Connacht with both sides having won only three of eight games. UIster let slip a 20-3 lead on their last trip to Galway as Connacht stormed back to win 22-20.