Ulster v Clermont Auvergne: Centre James Hume says he is growing in confidence

Hume made his Ireland debut last summer against the USA

Ulster centre James Hume says his performances this season have helped him grow in confidence as his side prepare to face Clermont Auvergne.

Hume was named in a 37-strong Ireland squad for the Six Nations this week after consistently impressing for the province in midfield.

Ulster are already assured of a last-16 spot in the Champions Cup ahead of the visit of the French side to Belfast.

"It's kind of doing what I know I'm good at," said Hume of his good form.

"Not going outside of my house of my basic skills and what I do well.

"Up until even the start of this season I'd have been going into games thinking 'what if I don't perform well here or the other players make me look stupid or I'm not good enough'.

"I think the Leinster and Clermont weeks were the ones where I was like 'I can do this' and it kind of followed on Northampton, Munster, Northampton again. I can look at those and be like 'I am good enough at that level to put out a performance'."

Hume was this week named in Ireland's 37-man squad for the Six Nations

Hume is aiming to make his Six Nations debut with Ireland on the back of an impressive season so far for Ulster, which he continued with a fine display in last weekend's win over Northampton on Sunday.

He said a conversation with Ireland head coach Andy Farrell after the November internationals has been a factor his good performances since.

"I had a good conversation with Faz the day before I left," he continued.

"He was just asking me how I thought that my Autumn nations went. It was almost just consistently being at the highest level and consistently performing there, whether that's working off the ball, making good decisions, being consistently focused during the game.

"He just said it's up to me and pretty much in my hands over these next block of games, what I'm going to do with them. I could go one way or the other.

"That was nice to hear, it was a positive chat. He had a lot of good things to say but that was just the one where I was falling behind, so I tried to execute that as well as possible."

In terms of specific changes to his game since November, the former RBAI pupil said ensuring each week that he had self-belief was one of the important ones.

"One of my real focus points was making a point at the start of every week that I need to have self-belief.

"There were some games that I would go into and I would take for granted that I'm there. I'd look at my opposition and not really appreciate how much damage I could actually do.

"Especially in that Leinster game, coming up against Robbie [Henshaw] as my opposite number that was a huge starting point, being like 'I've trained against this guy and I know how good he is, but I also know what threat I pose to him'.

"That just carried into the Clermont game and so on. Going away to Clermont in Europe and putting in a good performance against European giants is a massive confidence-booster.

"Even if times do get tough in the future, I can almost look back at that and think 'I'm more than capable of putting a performance out there' and just get back to my pillars and basics."