Stephen Ferris feels the last 120 minutes of Ulster's season has been hugely concerning as costly defeats to Leinster and Sale Sharks leaves them needing to rally quickly before a stretch of tough matches domestically and in Europe.
The province had succumbed to a Leinster comeback in the United Rugby Championship on 3 December and eight days later failed to trouble the scoreboard in a heavy 39-0 defeat to Sale in their Heineken Champions Cup opener.
"It's very disheartening," former Ulster and Ireland flanker Ferris told RTÉ's Game On.
"After the week before against Leinster, a second-half capitulation, I was expecting a bit of a reaction."
Instead, Ulster only mustered seven points in 120 minutes between the second half against Leinster and the full 80 versus Sale, coupled with the concession of 10 tries at the other end in that span.
"Everybody was talking Ulster up over the last couple of seasons. We all know they have got good pedigree, half decent players, maybe lacking a little bit in strength in depth and that was probably exposed a little bit against Sale," he said.
"However, they usually turn up in bigger games and to not even register a point on the board - I think it was seven points (scored) after the first half against Leinster, so 120 minutes of rugby - that is really, really concerning.
"I'm sure Dan McFarland and maybe more importantly Johnny Bell, the Ulster defence coach, will be reviewing that game against Sale because it was very, very disappointing."
Ferris also felt the on-field issues were compounded by the weather-related travel disruption on route to their destination, with the team having to fly over on the morning of the match, which itself was an early afternoon kick-off.
"It's not ideal. I suppose if Ulster had beaten Leinster last week and confidence was flying high, it probably wouldn't have mattered as much," he said.
"But because of the early kick-off, then your meal schedule goes out the window and the boys are probably eating grub on the flight on the way over and some of the guys in there are probably not in the best form - the likes of (Jacob) Stockdale, (James) Hume and even young (Nathan) Doak and Billy Burns are really struggling for form.
"(Tom) O'Toole at tighthead, he was starting ahead of Marty Moore, and then you've these guys who aren't flying high and haven't much confidence in themselves at the minute.
"The last thing they needed was travel disruption. They want everything to go plain sailing. They want everything to run like clockwork and it just didn't.
"You can forgive them for being sloppy for the first 15-20 minutes of the game and finding their mojo again and their rhythm, but they folded like a deckchair and for that to happen two weeks in a row is not ideal."
And it doesn't get easier for the province, with Ronan O'Gara's La Rochelle, the reigning European champions coming to Belfast for the next pool game on Saturday which already has the complexion of a must-win, before a URC clash against an improving Connacht 48 hours before Christmas Day.
"They lose this weekend, all of a sudden they have to go away to Connacht who had a good win against Newcastle at the weekend, then of course they have got Munster," he said.
"So all of a sudden, you lose this weekend, you're not looking forward to the next game. You're sort of apprehensive and Dan McFarland has got to rally the troops. This is where you earn your corn.
"With head coaches, it's all brilliant when you're winning every week but when your back's against the wall, you've got to come out fighting and that's something that I've admired about Graham Rowntree when (Munster) were in a bit of a rut at the start of the season and didn't have many players at their disposal.
"They galvanised together and somehow put four to five good games together and unfortunately it didn't happen for them just the way they would have liked against Toulouse, but Ulster have got to find that fight."
