“Totally fair.”

Former Ulster and Ireland back-row Stephen Ferris has come out and had his say on Brian O’Driscoll’s controversial comments about Ulster Rugby this week.

O’Driscoll told Off The Ball this week that he believes Ulster are a bit of a ‘basket case’ at the moment, and said if he were Ross Byrne or Joey Carbery, he might be reluctant to join them.

“Things are clearly not going right at Ulster. They don’t have a coach and it’s a little bit of a basket case at the moment.” O’Driscoll said

Current Ulster players Jacob Stockdale and Sean Reidy have rubbished O’Driscoll’s claims. But Ferris believes O’Driscoll was perhaps right to say what he said.

Ferris defended O’Driscoll while speaking to Adrian Barry on Friday’s Off The Ball AM:

“For Brian to come out with that opinion is totally fair, however I believe that going forward Ulster are a team that are going to galvanise themselves and get back together on the straight and narrow and try get to the heights they were at 5 or 6 years ago.” Ferris said

“I think people easily forget where Ulster were 5 or 6 years ago and there’s been articles about should they abolish Ulster and blah blah blah, I think that’s complete nonsense.

“I think there are great foundations in place at Ulster but just the last year has been so negative, Jacob Stockdale said he could count on one hand how many times Brian has been to Belfast – well I’m in Belfast every single day and it’s been on everybody’s lips about what’s happened in Ulster rugby over the last 18 months to two years, there has been so much negativity.

Ferris can also understand why Byrne and Carbery might now want to make the move up north.

“I would love to be able to sit here and tell you that Ulster have a new coach signed sealed and delivered and things are going to be a lot better for next season (I can’t).” Ferris said.

“I think that’s the main concern, nobody has a notion what’s going on, all we’re being told is that Jono Gibbs is leaving at the end of the season and they’re doing a coaching review that they’re going to get somebody employed, there’s names being bandied about but nothing is concrete.

“If I was Jordi Murphy or other players wanting to come to Belfast, would I, if I was playing for another club want to come to Belfast and play rugby in Belfast, probably not.