| Venue: DHL Stadium, Cape Town Date: 11 June Kick-off: 14:00 BST |
| Coverage: Live on BBC Radio Ulster and the BBC Sport website; match report on the BBC Sport NI website |
Ulster have named an unchanged starting line-up from the win over Munster for Saturday’s United Rugby Championship semi-final against the Stormers.
The Ulster side for the Cape Town game includes Springboks star Duane Vermeulen who is named at number eight.
James Hume and Nick Timoney also start after being named in the URC’s Dream Team for this season.
The Stormers make one change from their win over Edinburgh as centre Damian Willemse replaces Rikus Pretorius.
Otherwise, the South Africans’ 23 is completed unaltered from last weekend’s 28-17 win in Cape Town, with Ulster’s bench also unchanged.
The semi-final will see Vermeulen in action against his former club and pit him in number eight battle with exciting Stormers youngster Evan Roos.
“He’s a big ball-carrier for them. We play completely different styles. He’s back and running in the backline from lineouts and things like that whereas I’m with the forwards,” said the 35-year-old.
Vermeulen played for the Cape Town outfit between 2009 and 2015 and says he has been impressed with their form this season.
“I really enjoyed my time in Cape Town. I got the opportunity to go and play somewhere else and took it but I really enjoyed my time there.
“It’s a fantastic place, a good group of guys, and it’s nice to see them stepping up again and becoming as strong a club as they were back in the day.”
In the last meeting between the sides at the DHL Stadium in March, a slow start start saw Ulster trail 14-0 after 10 minutes but they were unlucky not to snatch a last-gasp win when a try by Callum Reid was controversially disallowed in a decision which URC chiefs admitted had probably been wrong.
“The TMO decision was disappointing but you can’t put yourself in that position and expect to win a game. Hopefully we can do a little bit better this time.”
Stormers: W Gelant; S Senatla, R Nel, D Willemse, L Zas; M Libbok, H Jantjies; S Kitshoff, JJ Kotze, F Malherbe; S Moerat, M Orie; D Fourie, H Dayimani, E Roos.
Replacements: AH Venter, B Harris, N Fouche, A Smith, E van Rhyn, N Xaba, G Masimla, S Mngomezulu.
Ulster: S Moore; R Baloucoune, J Hume, S McCloskey, E McIlroy; B Burns, J Cooney; A Warwick, R Herring, T O’Toole; A O’Connor, I Henderson (capt); Marcus Rea, N Timoney, D Vermeulen.
Replacements: J Andrew, E O’Sullivan, G Milasinovich, K Treadwell, Matthew Rea, N Doak, I Madigan, B Moxham.
