There are some Catholic players in the side but I couldn't even tell you who they were We are non- political, non-religious. Such topics are banned from the game."If the campaign has been marked by the footballing skills of Humphreys and the wonderful goal-kicking of the fullback, Simon Mason (he scored 20 points against Stade Francais), it has also been a personal success for Williams, a coach who is not exactly a household name outside the province. He signed a three-year contract last summer after resigning as headmaster of Holywood Primary School. "Teaching is a dreadful profession to be in at the moment," Williams said. "I would rather scrub floors than go back to that."This is Williams' second spell with Ulster and he has also coached Ireland A, Bective Rangers and Bangor, enjoying success with the latter in the Eighties "Nothing equates to this," he said "This has exceeded our wildest dreams.

I'm hoping it will encourage more players, like Paddy Johns and Jeremy Davidson, to come home." The headmaster is renowned, not for addresses of fire and brimstone, but for doing his homework He has issued the players with a little handbook. They call it the red handbook.Ulster's emblem is a bloody red hand (it features prominently on their jerseys) which perpetuates the legend of two warrior princes vying for ownership of the kingdom of Ulster. Whoever touched the coastline first would claim the territory and one of them cut off his hand and threw it on to the shore.Nobody can accuse Ulster of throwing in their hand. After opening their European campaign with a draw and a defeat, they proceeded to put two fingers up to everybody, winning six in a row Fortress Ravenhill has been a key factor. They lost to Toulouse 39-3 in the pool stage in France but beat them 29-24 in Belfast and then again 15-13 in the quarter-finals.Colomiers is to Toulouse what Lydney is to Gloucester and they will be thoroughly briefed.

However, the best advice for Colomiers is to stick plenty of cotton wool in their ears in an attempt to muffle the noise.Unlike Toulouse and Stade Francais, Colomiers have been spared a visit to Ravenhill where the capacity is 20,000. Instead they will find a sell- out crowd of 49,000 at Lansdowne Road, all but 3,000 of them Irish, despite the fact that the match is being televised live in Ireland and France and also featured on BBC's Grandstand.When Bath (no defence of the cup but wretched victims of England's withdrawal) beat Brive in Bordeaux last season the attendance was 36,500. Colomiers, a town with a population of 32,000 six kilometres from Toulouse, are bringing 1,000 supporters and another 2,000 tickets have been sold elsewhere in France. In Ireland there have been more than 60,000 applications for tickets.Last season Colomiers won the European Shield, stunning the likes of Richmond in the process. They have an exceptionally strong pack, which means that the Ulster front row can expect to be under the cosh again, and the great Jean-Luc Sadourny at full-back.They also have a white dove as their emblem, which doesn't quite portray the same message as a hand dripping with blood..

AS PETER DEAKIN leaves Saracens after two tub- thumping, ticket-shifting, all-singing, all-dancing years he can say: I did it my way. Regrets? Yes, he has a few, and most of them to do with the blazers and blunderers, whose antics this week, with delicious irony, took the heat off the leaked news of Deakin's departure to Warrington Wolves. The new role, as chief executive at the Super League club, is a dream come true for Deakin, a dyed-in-the-wool league man. He leaves behind the nightmarish growing pains of the "other code", in the infancy of professionalism. "It's been a very sad decision," he said. "I'm leaving a fantastic club and a fantastic owner in Nigel Wray - not only an owner but a friend and a work colleague. But this is purely a selfish thing, something I've dreamed about as a kid and growing up through being a professional player with Oldham, and being involved in sales and marketing for the last 20 years. I've always wanted to be able to run my own club."Deakin speaks with typical enthusiasm of Warrington Council, Greenalls plc and two entrepreneurs, Bill Holroyd and Simon Moran, who are putting new bite into the Wolves.