Bowe optimistic about Ulster’s prospects

Veteran Ulster wing Tommy Bowe is optimistic about his side's prospects for the upcoming season and is keen to return to action after recovering from injury.

Ulster face tournament newbies the Cheetahs, in their first PRO14 clash on Septermber 1 at home. They also take on Premiership side Wasps in a week's time in their first pre-season fixture.

The majority of Ulster's squad are at a Portuguese training camp and Bowe, who returns from a broken ankle while playing for Ireland in the Six Nations, feels they are doing great preparation work ahead of those two games.

"Guys push themselves to the absolute limit here and to go and get a bit of heat and sunshine really refreshes the body," he told the Belfast Telegraph.

"We probably train harder over here because the weather is very hot, you sweat more and breathing is more difficult.

"But the muscles seem to react very well to it, so it means we can push ourselves that bit harder and recover a bit easier.

"It gets us ready for the start of the new season and hopefully we will be firing by then."

Ulster director of rugby Les Kiss has made changes to the coaching staff and Bowe says that they are already making their prescence felt.

“Jono (Gibbes, head coach), Dwayne (Peel, assistant coach) and Aaron (Dundon, set-piece coach) have offered a fresh voice, a different opinion and they are really enthusing all the guys," he added.

“They have new ideas and they have commanded a huge amount of respect from the players.

“Everyone seems to be really responding well to them and I’d be very hopeful that they would have a very positive impact on the squad over the next couple of years. But it’s still obviously early on, we’ve played no games yet, so we will have to see how it goes.”

Ulster are still looking to add a new fly-half to their ranks. They do have three new players stepping in to fill the shoes of the now departed Ruan Pienaar, Roger Wilson and Franco van der Merwe.

“We obviously have big Jean ‘Big Red’ Deysel as we call him, he’s a big unit,” added Bowe.

“Himself and Wiehahn (Herbst) have almost become inseparable already and he’s only been here a week or two. We haven’t seen much of Schalk (van der Merwe) yet and then John Cooney has come in as well.

“And there are also a lot of new young fellows coming through the ranks as well, which is always really good to see. For the older lads, like myself, it’s good have these young guys come in and bring real enthusiasm — you feed off that.

“There’s a good mix in the squad and we’re all pushing each other hard.”