Familiar faces connected to Schools’ Cup semi-final clash with RBAI and Methody

The two Belfast schools are the most successful in the competitions history with 68 outright wins between them.

The current Inst squad may be inexperienced but have a few familiar names in it.

Former Ulster captain and European Cup winner Andy Ward’s son Bryn was a try scorer in the quarter-final win at Sullivan.

Former Ulster prop and current Instonians coach Clem Boyd’s son Jacob is following in his father’s footsteps in the front row while Dan Soper, who led Inst to three consecutive Schools’ Cup wins with the likes of Michael Lowry and James Hume in the team and is now Ulster backs coach, has son Callum in the squad at scrum half.

“I never actually played with ‘Wardy’ (Andy), he actually coached me for a bit of a season with Niall Malone, so I know him for back then,” said RBAI Director of Rugby Jamie Kirk. “Jacob is an excellent player, he’s a prop and is very dynamic and very explosive with the ball, he’s a chip off the old block but he has an edge to him in the loose which is good, and he is definitely an exciting player.

“Callum is the youngest in the squad and covers scrum half, he has just come into the squad and is enjoying the experience of it.

“We’d be heavy on lower sixth and there aren’t that many upper sixth, more than half the team would be younger, a lot of the lower sixth boys played in the Medallion final so they have experience in bigger games and they are hungry to get back to the Kingspan.

“We’re young but certainly looking forward to the challenge.”

Kirk was into the RBAI job just before Covid put a halt to sport.

“Last year was a pretty frustrating start personally, in some ways it gave me the opportunity to learn more about the school, the culture of the school and what it is about,” he