Today's events at Raven hill are in essence something football super league moneymen can only dream about. This is Belfast against Paris, the prize being Ireland's right to stage the European final in Dublin. Truly, Irish rugby has never known anything like it.

That Ulster are hosting Stade Francais, the creme de la creme of French club rugby, in the European Cup semi-finals is a marvellous achievement. Harry Williams and his team have pretty much wrung every last drop of inspiration out of themselves so far in playing more or less to the maximum of their ability.

Boosted by a run of six successive wins and huge team spirit, no-one has been letting them down and every one of them has been playing well. It will, therefore, be no surprise to see the key men, Andy Ward and David Humphreys, have big games again, along with the rest of the back row and emerging Irish A contender Mark Blair.

Conceivably, though, they'll need to play even better than they did against Toulouse, with the same backdrop - home advantage, wind and rain, and first use of the elements. Indeed the toss could be of cricket-like importance.

Coupled with the most passionate and partisan crowd Ravenhill will probably ever have experienced, driving rain and a howling gale would seem the likeliest setting for Ulster to fluster the classy ones.

A wet and windy December night in Ravenhill undoubtedly contributed to Toulouse's downfall in the quarter-finals. Ulster were able to adopt a policy of going for three points via drop goals and penalties within a 50-metre radius of the Toulouse sticks, and won through by limiting Toulouse to just one seven-pointer.

Then again, Stade are probably adaptable enough to play to any weather conditions, and in tactical lynchpin Diego Dominguez have the man for all seasons. The difference in the respective performances of the out-halves, David Humphreys and Yann Delaigue, was undoubtedly the winning and the losing of the quarter-final match.

One couldn't imagine the unflustered Dominguez missing three drop goal attempts or a penalty from under the posts. Furthermore, with Dominguez turning around Ulster's four-up defence and outside three either with his unerringly probing kicks from the hand, or launching the target runners off his shoulder, Stade are unlikely to be as strangely one-dimensional (via the line-out maul) as Toulouse were.

For example, it's unlikely that Dominguez and his cohorts will wait 78 minutes before releasing the competition's joint leading try scorer Thomas Lombard, or on the right wing, another incumbent French international Arthur Gomes. On top of which, it should be remembered, Toulouse went into that Ulster game with the cloud of their Ebbw Vale shenanigans hanging over them when they lost the plot on and off the pitch, both during and after the game. Stade Francais come into this game with no such psychological baggage. They will undoubtedly have a few short fuses up front along with their abrasive centre Richard Dourthe. However, they will also be mindful of Ulster's main weapon, the extraordinarily prolific Simon Mason, who is the competition's sole ton-up man.

"Without a doubt the key area for us will be in keeping our discipline," admits their English flanker Richard Pool-Jones. "There must be no opportunity of the slightest element of indiscipline creeping into our game."

Not one of Stade's starting lineup this afternoon played against Castres on the home front last week, the French champions willingly taking that defeat on the chin so as none of their preferred XV ran the risk of injury for this game. The European Cup is very much their priority. Hence, the likes of Vincent Moscato, Serge Simon, Marc Lievremont and Franck Comba have to be content with a place on the bench, while Fijian winger Emori Bolobolo cannot even make today's 22.

Ever since they did for Pontypridd by 71-14 in the quarterfinals, Stade have been planning for this one. And, while it is true that Leinster's games with Stade have given Ulster a couple of videos and some valuable insights into the French champions, the flip side is that Ulster's pair of wins over Toulouse will have done the same for Stade.

Bernard Laporte and his players have, apparently, been pouring over the videos and going through Ulster's game in minute detail. Much of this week's training has concentrated on defending high balls - a source of susceptibility against Leinster - in the safe presumption that they will be bombarded with aerial stuff from Humphreys.

It could be that in all of this Stade will almost be too respectful of their hosts, as can occasionally be the case when French sides come to Ireland. Thus, it wouldn't be all that surprising if both teams consciously contribute to a fairly tight game for the first half or hour. But at some point the French side will surely strive to cut loose, and they also have a discernibly stronger bench (including a quartet of internationals and five forwards) than Ulster have to call upon whenever the inevitable injuries and/or tactical changes are required.

The key for Ulster, as Allen Clarke states, is for them to be still in the game at half-time. Then, the 20,000 crowd becomes a factor. Were they not to be, however, and say Stade blitz them in the first 10 minutes, then the crowd could become more of a hindrance than a 16th man, for it's hard to see Ulster successfully playing catch-up. And perish the thought were Ward or Humphreys to get injured, the situation would be serious, for Mark McCall and Stephen Bell are already notable losses.

The Ulster scrum could well come under pressure, and Ward will need plenty of back-up on the gain line, for once Stade Francais breach it, their ability to stay on their feet and keep the ball alive at pace is on a different par to anything Ulster have faced so far.

The penalties of Mason and perhaps the drop goals of Humphreys are sure to set Stade some sort of target, but whereas it's hard to see where the home side will supplement these with seven-pointers, unlike Toulouse, Stade look more capable of hitting back with a few of them.

In any event, the old cliche about anything from now on being a bonus readily applies, although there lurks the suspicion that this may be a game too far.