Humphreys a humble hero

He's been described variously as moody, mercurial, gifted, a genius, supremely talented, a confidence player, flawed, brittle, enigmatic, and so on. Hey, not alone was he more fun to watch than anyone, he was more fun to write about. For a while there this season however, he was almost entitled to the sobriquet Mr Consistency. This, for David Humphreys? Is nothing sacred any more?

He would be "honoured" to be named so, though he self-deprecatingly admits: "some people would have heart attacks over their breakfast if I was called that."

Inconsistent would have been another adjective regularly used in conjunction with the name Humphreys, but this season it would have been more misplaced than ever before. He's played in all 17 of Ulster's games this season - captaining them in the last 13 - and though modesty forbids him from blowing his own trumpet he'll go so far as to observe: "Personally, if I look back (on this season) I can't say I've had any absolute howlers of games."

In this there is a tacit admission that perhaps there were a few in the past sprinkled in amongst the fair dollop of inspired ones. "I haven't had any absolute blinders either," he adds.

Surely you jest, David? What about the semi-final, that 80metre wonder try, the drop goal, and outdoing the little generalissimo Diego Dominguez? "Well, alright," he says modestly, "just because I scored a try that day."

It's been his and Ulster's best season ever though - hardly coincidentally. e, but maybe it's because I really am enjoying it now. Whether its for Dungannon or Ulster, even though I'm an absolute nervous wreck, I'm still looking forward to playing."

Two seasons ago, he was commuting from Belfast to London - where he was finishing his studies to become a solicitor - while playing for London Irish. Hardly conducive to playing his best rugby. Now he is playing for Dungannon, his coaches and his team-mates at Ulster and Dungannon say that Humphreys is quite simply happier within himself, and there's no great mystery to it.

He's married now, is surrounded by long-standing friends and team-mates, playing for the his favoured red hand of Ulster, and what's more, captaining them as well in his own quiet, unfussy, inspiring lead-by-example way. The cap fits.

"Again, whether it's co-incidental or not, I don't know. But when I look back over my career, probably some of the times when I've been playing my best, at schools, at university, I was captain then.

"Having said that, if you asked me at the start of the season, did I want it, I'd have gone `nope'. It wasn't something I was particularly interested in. To be honest captaining Ulster has been pretty easy with people like Wardy (Andy Ward), Allen Clarke and Jonathan Bell. It hasn't changed much of my game, because that's about decision-making anyway. But I have enjoyed it."

Winning, of course, helps more than anything. He has mixed feelings about London Irish, but he enjoyed and played well in a relatively successful post-Christmas run at Sunbury. "There was a time there when I played probably the best rugby I've ever played."

Though, on some of his bad days, when he appeared to let an early mistake get to him, Humphreys has looked a bit of a self-doubter, he's mildly astonished at the notion that he's sensitive to criticism. In fact, he generally tries to avoid reading the press, whether good, bad or indifferent, and dismisses critiques as mostly coming from people who aren't qualified to pass judgement.

"And as you get older, you realise there are going to be ups and downs, and it's how you cope with them which shows whether you are a good player." Like many an Irish player, he's been through the mill and has come through it well.

Nonetheless, Humphreys bristles a little when being easily tagged, and refutes the label "confidence player" (which suggests a certain flakiness) by saying that every player is a confidence player. "When you have confidence you obviously play better, and I'm no different than anyone else, but not to the extent that's made out."

His confidence couldn't be higher now, given a run of nine games for club and province. Compare that with the unfortunate Eric Elwood, the first choice of Irish coach Warren Gatland, but part of a depressed Galwegians team at the foot of AIL Division One. The winning feeling has only come for Elwood against Ulster, back in August, and the World Cup qualifiers against Georgia and Romania.

Surely, Humphreys has never been closer to a place in the starting line-up for Ireland since he was dropped after the opening Five Nations defeat to Scotland a year ago. "I would love to be playing for Ireland, but at the same time I totally respect Warren's decision. Eric has played very well for Ireland in the last year or so. I'll just keep playing away."

Humphreys maintains he didn't play that badly against Scotland. He admits he'd like to have played more than 11 times for Ireland, though honoured to have done so, and says he still wants it.

"I want it just as much as I ever did. The main reason I play rugby because I aspire to play international rugby. I want to play at the highest level I possibly can and until the day I retire that will always be my objective."

A very nice, pleasant and extremely polite fellow, a nondrinker and non-smoker, Humphreys remains an essentially private person who wouldn't exactly be shouting "yippee" at the thought of an interview. You sense that the less people know about him, the better he likes it.

Hence, it's all the more surprising to learn that he promised his team-mates the game of his life before the kick-off against Stade Francais, and less surprising to learn that he wishes that wasn't known.

"It's actually something I didn't think would get into the public domain. It was one of those things. It wasn't something I planned to say. We were just getting ourselves for a semi-final and it just seemed the right thing to say. I felt good going out. It could easily have been the worst thing I ever said if I'd had an absolute shocker but I didn't believe I was going to go and it worked out alright."

That it did. But no promises today, at least none for the public domain. Will you win? "We can win, and we will win if we play very well. But although people are getting carried away and despite what the press say, Colomiers are very, very strong up front and hard to break down. We're going to be in a battle. But at least we know we can win. Hopefully we can raise our level of performance to the same as before, and maybe higher."