McCall: This will be Ravenhill’s biggest night

Ulster’s Heineken Cup quarter-final against Saracens on Saturday will be the biggest home match in the club’s history, according to Sarries’ Director of Rugby, Mark McCall.

The former Ulster man will lead Sarries out against his former side at the newly refurbished Ravenhill Park and believes it will be a momentous occasion in the province’s history.

“The point is the magnitude of the game for them really,” McCall said. “They would say this is the biggest home game in their history — they’ve obviously played bigger games in European Cup finals — but this is the biggest home game that they’ve had.

“They’ve had three away quarter-finals and this is their first home quarter-final. From what I can gather they could have sold Ravenhill out many times over.

“It’s a huge game, people are talking about nothing else. It’s a bit different for our players because we had Harlequins and we had Wasps and it was only really on Monday morning we started talking about how big it’s going to be over there and to make sure that we’re not surprised by what we find.

“When we went to Thomond Park two years ago, which was the last equivalent atmosphere — some of our players were a bit taken aback. It’s not like an international match, it’s much more intense and more hostile than what you get ironically in an 80,000 crowd. I don’t want us to be surprised — when you’re not surprised, you can look forward to it and relish it.”

McCall hinted Billy Vunipola could make a comeback and feature against Mark Anscombe’s side.

The No 8 has been suffering with an ankle injury and was thought to have been ruled out of the clash.

However, former Ulster player and couch McCall revealed at the club’s St Albans base yesterday that the England international was in training and hopes were high he would play. “We’ll make a decision on Billy Vilapola in the week. We has a chance,” McCall said.

“We are a bit more hopeful than 50 per cent, Billy has done some training this week.”

Ulster have an injury problem of their own, with star man Ruan Pienaar injured, and there appears to be a game of brinkmanship forming as McCall claims Ulster will be able to field their scrum-half.

The South African has not played since sustaining a shoulder injury in the win over Scarlets on March 14 but his omission from the defeat to Cardiff at the weekend was precautionary.

“They are being as cagey as we are,” said McCall.