I really don’t like the term “unseen” work.
It implies that the work that players put in during a game – usually tight five forwards but it can apply elsewhere too – that can’t be looked at on ESPN stats or that doesn’t show up on a sizzle reel post-game is somehow less valuable or, even worse, a made-up metric used to justify a selection. Breakdown work, lineout lifting, scrummaging, mauling – even defence, at times – can get wrapped up in the nebulous definition of “unseen work”.
It’s a bit of a bluffer’s charter, in one way, and often only used only by partial pundits trying to hide their bias because if you subscribe to this idea of unseen work – which is a nonsense, because if you can see it on the pitch, then it is not unseen – you can use it both positively and negatively depending on your situation. Are one of your guys playing but not making a very overt impact noticeable to Johnny Casual sitting at home drinking a can?
“It’s all the unseen work he was doing, you see, you just don’t get it.”
It works the opposite way, too.
I promise I started this article before I saw this tweet and yes, this is an article about Jean Kleyn.
Stephen Ferris and Edward O’Sullivan’s bizarre rant on Jean Kleyn’s performance post-game bore no relation to what happened on the pitch, in my opinion.
In a way, it’s bizarre that I have to write this article because it’s not like Kleyn played out of his skin and dominated the game but yet I find the need to point out what he actually did, and why it’s important, to try to counter the nonsense spouted on RTE.
Firstly, I want to clear up this idea about unseen work. It doesn’t exist. You either did things on the pitch or you didn’t, and there’s no hiding place whatsoever in the modern game for “invisible” work.
So what is “work” or “work rate” as described by Joe Schmidt about Kleyn post-match?
To understand this as it pertains to a second-row player, we have to look into that lock’s role at the set-piece, in combination with his partner, and then in his wider role in the pack.
These roles will usually be tailored to your second row’s traits and abilities in the context of the level you’re playing at. The traits you look for between both lock forwards can be quite similar, but you need workable lineout height, scrummaging power, mauling weight, ball-carrying, dominant ruck clearing, power in centre-field defence and a massive engine.
This is where work-rate comes into play. I class work rate for most second rows in the set-piece, with their up and down speed (how many rucks/carries/tackles they make and how quickly they return to the line after completion) in phase play on both sides of the ball as another important indicator of a complete lock forward.
If you’re a guy like Kleyn, with your scrummaging and maul work as a big trait of yours, then you will have a target number of positive involvements you’ll want to achieve. If I’m a coach looking at him, and looking at his traits, I want to see big power from him in the scrum first and foremost. I think we got that.
This is just one example but it’s pretty typical of Kleyn’s work behind Porter on the tighthead side of the scrum. It’s simplifying it a fair bit but, in general, the loosehead is trying to angle down the scrum while the tighthead is trying to angle up and then in. The lock forward’s role in this matches what their prop is doing and the key points of difference between scrummaging locks are in their body shape, footwork and power transfer once the scrum engages.
The bigger you are as a second row, the heavier you are and the bigger and heavier you are, the harder it is to maintain a power position while scrummaging. The ideal power position for a second row forward in a scrum is legs back, shins in line with the floor, back straight, your arms and your arse in the same line and on your toes ready to drive through. When the call to push comes in, you want to dip down and then drive forward. You might get a call to go towards a certain shoulder depending on what your prop is doing, but ideally, you want to keep driving in a straight line.
The taller and heavier you are, the harder this is to do at the very highest level. Do it to a high level, and you get serious power transfer through onto your front row. Kleyn, at 6’8″ and 120kg, is really good at this aspect of the game and you can see the transfer of power coming from his side.
The tighthead side gets the job done on this one. Porter’s side lifts the Italian loosehead and hooker, which creates the space to drive through.
Watch Kleyn reset his feet in response to some early pressure from the Italian loosehead on Porter.
That helps the shove after the strike immensely and it puts some real wattage behind Porter, who’s a sturdy, powerful man himself.
Back at the original scrum example, you can get a better look at it.
This looks really tight. His toes are firmly dug in here, and he’s set right in line where I’d want him. Toner’s right foot, by comparison, is a little off where it needs to be here, in my opinion.
When the pressure comes through, Kleyn and Porter really attack the loosehead side. You can see Kleyn get strong right shoulder pressure on Porter as he drives through, here
I thought his scrummaging was a big plus in this game. He didn’t do it all on his own – no one does – but he was a key part of Ireland’s overall scrum dominance. Not so unseen when you know what you’re looking at.
Anyway, onto his other roles.
I thought Jean’s lineout and maul work was pretty good. Offensively, he was the jumper and fulcrum for the Irish mauled try.
You need a good strong jump, a big plant on landing, a reliable ball transfer and the power to pivot the maul around the opposition shove before transitioning into a drive position yourself.
We almost scored from a similar position in the first half;
Look at the basics – Kleyn’s strong jump, heavy plant and brace, the smooth ball transfer, the pivot and then the transition to forward pushing pressure.
His maul defence was pretty strong too, but it looked a little below his usual standards. The power was there – and then some – but he, along with the rest of the pack, looked a little confused as to their roles and positioning on close-range maul defence.
Here’s one example of some positive maul defence;
That’s a strong touchline shove by Porter and Kleyn – there is zero movement there for Italy. I’m not delighted with our infield side – Toner isn’t really shoving on anything here but can’t be too aggressive with his positioning without risking a penalty.
Ruddock looks a little uncertain in the cover position and rightly so. Ireland are defending a 5v8 maul situation here but we’re looking unsteady on the infield side. You can see Ruddock looking to shift across to cover where he thinks Italy are peeling to.
You can get an example of Kleyn’s power here as he strikes the maul a few times as he comes around.
Every hit in gives a momentary stop – impressive – but Ireland conceded the penalty anyway. On the next shove, Ireland went for another five on eight defensive alignment.
Kleyn is more central this time, and Ireland’s initial counter-shove is quite good. McGrath and Porter hold up the flanks, while Kleyn and then Toner brace the middle. For me, Ruddock made a poor decision to attack the touchline side. I can see why he did it – Italy looked to be shifting there – but I think he’d have been better off tracking to behind our maul. O’Donnell is pretty well-positioned to cover the break, but Italy have good depth on their maul build and can peel around to attack infield.
From here, Ireland needed patience. I’d have liked Ruddock to stall his entry by a second or two here, given he was attacking a dead part of the maul, but I’d have like Kleyn to either stay out of the maul entirely or, failing that, get a shot on the ball carrier.
Luke McGrath is doing his best to spot the carrier, but this was one aspect – maul entry decisions after the initial shove – where I thought Kleyn could have done better on overall.
Breakdown
Every player only has so many actions they can do on a field because there is only so much energy a player has. It’s not really possible to rack up 20 tackles, 15 carries, 5 lineout takes and scrum/maul for a full 80 minutes.
You have to watch your energy output and a player’s work rate has to take that into account. I thought Kleyn’s up and down speed during this game was pretty good, but will only improve as he gets used to this level.
He carried the ball nine times in the hammer zone, making decent ground most times under quite a bit of pressure. He had one poor knock-on that he’ll want back again but overall, he did exactly what you’d want from a guy with his frame when it came to ball carrying. He was big, he was strong, and he took some stopping.
His defence was good too, with some good “impact stops” on Italy up the middle of the field. He, along with Toner, was a victim of our backrow’s positional issues at times in the first half, but overall I thought he put a good shift in here, with 16 tackles – second-best on the day behind O’Donnell with 17.
Pretty good stuff. He was a big strong centre-field defender and dominated a fair few collisions against some big Italian runners.
Nine carries. Sixteen tackles. Some heavy lifts on Toner. Scrummaging. Mauling. There was plenty of work rate there. So what about his breakdown work?
I had a look.
| Player | Dominant Action | Guard Action | Passive Action | Ineffective Action |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Porter | 16 | 8 | 0 | 0 |
| Kleyn | 16 | 7 | 0 | 1 |
| J. McGrath | 10 | 3 | 2 | 2 |
| O'Donnell | 10 | 6 | 1 | 1 |
| Ruddock | 9 | 5 | 1 | 1 |
| Toner | 5 | 15 | 3 | 2 |
| Murphy | 5 | 13 | 1 | 0 |
| Farrell | 5 | 3 | 0 | 0 |
| Ringrose | 5 | 10 | 0 | 1 |
| Carbery | 3 | 3 | 0 | 0 |
| Kearney | 3 | 3 | 0 | 1 |
| Scannell | 3 | 7 | 1 | 0 |
| Ryan | 3 | 4 | 0 | 0 |
| Herring | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Larmour | 2 | 4 | 0 | 0 |
| Henderson | 1 | 3 | 0 | 0 |
| L. McGrath | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Healy | 0 | 1 | 0 | 0 |
| Beirne | 0 | 2 | 0 | 0 |
Kleyn had the same amount of dominant cleanouts as Porter, with just one fewer guard.
Some of those cleans were really effective, aggressive and timely.
As an aside, Eddie O’Sullivan, in response to this tweet from Murray Kinsella, thinks the first GIF in that loop could have been a penalty for “leading with the elbow“. I… uh… don’t think so, Edward.
To finish up, I don’t think this performance from Jean Kleyn was one for the ages or anything, but it was far from kind of performance that the hysterics from Edward and Stephen suggested. Joe Schmidt loves hardworking, heavy second-row forwards and Kleyn’s presence in the squad ahead of Quinn Roux could show that Schmidt views Kleyn as an upgrade of sorts. Kleyn is a hard, hammer zone carrier, a good lineout option, a big set-piece player and an aggressive rucker.
