One thing you can rarely criticise any Irish team – national or provincial – is a lack of effort or work rate.
Irish players are known as proper grafters when they go outside the Irish system for a good reason. The quality might fluctuate, as it does for almost every player or team, but the effort never does.
So, after a chastening defeat at home to the All Blacks, one thing that could be guaranteed on Monday was that Ireland’s effort levels at the breakdown would be increased on Friday. And so it went.
The problem was, that this increase in work rate wasn’t followed by the kind of efficiency we needed to right the wrongs of the previous week in an emphatic fashion. It was enough for a win, sure, but the lingering disappointment in the performance is rooted in the breakdown.
Tell me what you notice about these numbers;
| Dominant Clean | Guard Action | Attendance | Ineffective | Ruck Work Score | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. Porter | 7 | 7 | 1 | 19 | |
| 2. Kelleher | 2 | 17 | 3 | 43 | |
| 3. Bealham | 8 | 1 | 1 | 15 | |
| 4. McCarthy | 15 | 3 | 8 | 17 | |
| 5. Ryan | 1 | 12 | 2 | 2 | 25 |
| 6. Beirne | 1 | 15 | 5 | 2 | 34 |
| 7. Van Der Flier | 20 | 9 | 3 | 43 | |
| 8. Doris | 11 | 6 | 2 | 24 | |
| 9. Gibson Park | 0 | ||||
| 10. Crowley | 6 | 12 | |||
| 11. Lowe | 4 | 1 | 2 | 5 | |
| 12. Henshaw | 1 | 13 | 1 | 30 | |
| 13. Ringrose | 1 | 18 | 39 | ||
| 14. Hansen | 8 | 1 | 14 | ||
| 15. Keenen | 1 | 10 | 1 | 21 | |
| 16. Herring | 7 | 1 | 15 | ||
| 17. Healy | 5 | 1 | 11 | ||
| 18. Clarkson | 12 | 4 | 3 | 22 | |
| 19. Baird | 0 | ||||
| 20. O'Mahony | 6 | 1 | 1 | 11 | |
| 21. Casey | 1 | 1 | 5 | ||
| 22. Prendergast | 1 | 2 | |||
| 23. Osbourne | 1 | 3 | 9 |
Top ORW Scorers
- Ronan Kelleher/Josh Van Der Flier – 43 points
- Garry Ringrose – 39 points
- Tadhg Beirne – 34 points
- Robbie Henshaw – 30 points
- James Ryan – 25 points
That’s a lot of Attendances, right? It’s the most all year. The next highest was the loss to England and the scrappy win over Scotland. High Attendance numbers normally mean a lot of kicking – ruck extension – and/or a lot of extra bodies getting thrown into rucks as security.
Our scoring was improved on last week’s game by some distance but at the expense of a lot more ruck entries. When we consider the amount of ORW points scored per entry, a fairly stark picture is painted. I’ve included the average ORW points per ruck entry scoring from the rest of the year as a reference point.
- France – 1.63 ORW points per ruck entry
- Italy – 1.37 ORW points per ruck entry
- Wales – 1.79 ORW points per ruck entry
- England – 1.51 ORW points per ruck entry
- Scotland – 1.59 ORW points per ruck entry
- Springboks 1 – 1.63 ORW points per ruck entry
- Springboks 2 – 1.78 ORW points per ruck entry
- New Zealand – 1.35 ORW points per ruck entry
- Argentina – 1.48 ORW points per ruck entry
Why is the number of ruck entries important for Ireland? We run a system that thrives when it has layers and options to work with, particularly forwards acting as active blockers, passers and screen runners. The more forwards that are involved in rucks, the less forwards are available to provide us with the depth that we need to make our system work.
In the last two weeks, we have produced really low-quality ORW scoring per entry – not per ruck – back-to-back.
When Ireland are at their best at the breakdown – which is separate from winning and losing – they rack up big ORW scoring with fewer ruck entries. So, naturally, each ruck entry produces better quality possession and, crucially, leaves more forwards on their feet on average across the full 80 minutes.
When we assess the Collective Offensive Ruck Work scoring per ruck we see another interesting number;
Against the All Blacks, it was 3.44 CORW per ruck on just 52 rucks. Against Argentina last Friday it was 3.49 CORW per ruck on 119 rucks. More than double the number of rucks and the efficiency of scoring per ruck stayed more or less the same.
Why did this game feel like a worse performance than the loss to New Zealand? There’s your answer, more or less.
The high volume of ruck entries – with a load of passive attendance scoring – tells me pretty clearly that teams are giving us our quick ball because they know we’re going to take our own attacking components out of the game to avoid getting “beaten up at the breakdown”.
We overcompensated for our lack of rucks against New Zealand by overcommitting to our rucks in this game and produced the same problem, just from the other end of the spectrum.
On an individual basis, I think it’s clear that Andrew Porter is not producing his usual quality at the breakdown; two games in a row now have seemed to pass him by. He looks lethargic and like he’s cut a fair bit of weight in the off-season.
Caelan Doris, too, seems to have shifted roles since the Six Nations. He averaged 43 ORW points per game in Ireland’s title-winning Six Nations campaign but, since July, has only averaged 23 ORW points per game. That’s because his ruck entries are lower. Doris has averaged 18.5 ruck entries against the Springboks, New Zealand and Argentina in the last four games. In the five games of the Six Nations, Doris averaged 23.5 entries per game.
- Six Nations 2024: 1.83 ORW per entry
- Summer to November 2024: 1.24 ORW per entry
What does this tell us? A fairly dramatic shift in role to a more pronounced carrying role and, so far at least, it’s not working for him.
Another player who has shifted roles is Tadhg Beirne; he had another disengaged performance for 60 minutes… until James Ryan went off the field and he could shift back into a more central role. His ORW scoring went through the roof when he moved back infield and he finished in the top three for scoring after a massive final 20 minutes. The edge role doesn’t suit him and Andy Farrell’s attempt to square that selection circle – lineout & ruck security vs McCarthy’s supposed physical impact – isn’t working as intended.
Ronan Kelleher’s performance was really good. I bumped him to a three-star performance off the back of a massive game at the breakdown – 1.93 ORW per ruck entry in just 62 minutes.
Garry Ringrose and Robbie Henshaw produced the highest combined midfield ORW score since Bundee Aki and Robbie Henshaw’s game against Wales in the Six Nations earlier this year. Is that a good thing? It usually is with this Irish team but watching this back in detail, I felt that it was almost a reaction to our inability to advance up the field, almost as an expression of Argentina giving us enough quick ball to choke on and then stuffing any attempt we made to get into the 3/4 space and beyond with their superior numbers.
