When you strip back any attacking structure, it ultimately comes down to your structure off 9.
All your radiant structures – your work off 10 or even 12 – radiate back to your work off the scrumhalf in the vast, vast majority of cases, be that the actual #9 or another player stepping into the role. Earlier in the season, we looked at Munster’s embryonic structures as they toured South Africa and navigated the early parts of the season under the new influence of Stephen Larkham.
Since then, Munster have stuck mostly to the same structures, with some slight variations based on the opposition and the context of the game in the moment. What I mean by that is that we can be quite fluid in these structures depending on whether or we not we are winning expected collisions in the phases preceding a certain structural reset off a ruck.
For the most part, Munster have used a 1-3-3-1 against physically bigger teams and 2-3-2-1 against sides where we expect to have a bit of physical dominance.
Here’s an example of how the 2-3-2-1 looks, although this is a 3-2 structure just based on the rough numbers we had available on this phase.
You can see the rough build in our work off Murray and the reasoning behind in. We pass to Holland in the lead carrier position, who pops the ball off to Wycherley for a nice wide gain. This doesn’t create a huge amount of gainline, but it does chop out a lot of Ospreys’ centre-field defence and, crucially, generates quick ball.
When the Ospreys reset after the ruck, they show us a picture that we’ll probably have been training for. When the 2-3-2-1 shape is at its most effective, it has two powerful, mobile forward carriers in that extended “Midfield Two” spot.
Hanrahan will take the ball off this ruck and has plenty of options to “pin” the opposition in place. The Ospreys have been “chopped” into creating a big overload on the blindside so that means there will be space in the wider channels if Munster can keep the ruck defenders in place.
Haley’s inside shoulder line holds the Ospreys pillar defender, Hanrahan’s link position holds the B defender and that creates a workable position for Hanrahan to hit. JJ has three pass options on his outside shoulder, one inside shoulder pass and a potential carry of his own. He has to make the choice in the moment.
Scannell has an inside hip position on Stander which will encourage the ideal isolation we want for O’Donoghue on the outside of the pod but that option will stress Hanrahan’s pass across the gap.
Stander does a great job of holding the forward seam defender and that creates the isolation we’re looking for on the outside – O’Donoghue on Price. For me, Price makes the only positive read he can here and steps into the space between Stande and O’Donoghue. At the moment before releasing the ball, you can see the pass options that Hanrahan has to work with – all happening in a quarter of a second – so you don’t blame him for going at the clear linebreak option.
You can see what we were looking to achieve in this little sequence though. Chop out defensive numbers off #9 and then hit the Midfield Two arrayed off #10 for possible centre-field linebreaks at the seam between the last opposition forward and first opposition back.
You can see what the inside shoulder option looks like on this structure here.
There’s an extra midfield player – closer to 3-3 – but they are aligned off #10 as above.
We’ve also continued our “L” shape off #9 too, with the recessed third forward arriving late as a potential pass option or as a cleanout with an extra few steps of momentum.
I think we’re a little too committed to the carry straight off the pass here – a complaint you could stretch out to the last few games actually) – but you can see the idea is to hit that seam again. North is the first back defender outside Tipuric, O’Donoghue knows this and goes to “chop” that space. We’ve consistently looked to extend our lines off #9 this season with this “chopping” idea in mind, albeit with mixed results.
We go for the long pass option off #9 here – again looking for that seam – but it doesn’t quite work out.
Even then, it creates an opportunity for the Blindside Two in the half transition that comes after Archer’s offload.
Against physically bigger teams, we’ve used 1-3-3-1 more regularly.
The reasons for this are fairly simple. 1-3-3-1 gives you more solidity in the middle of the field and, in theory, gives you a better shot at retaining the ball phase for phase with two dedicated cleanout options on the inside and outside shoulder.
Looking to retain that ball in contact was the primary aim on these carries, especially away to Racing and Saracens. You can’t really blame the players either. We’re going for extra width on these carries off #9 – which seems to have stressed some of Murray’s passing in some moments – but against Racing we didn’t really get the kind of “chop outs” that we wanted.
I have seen us use a False 1-3-3-1 at times. I’ve put in my notes when I’ve seen it but the cleanest look I got at it was in that away game in Paris.
Here’s what I mean.
At first glance, this looks like a slightly messy 3-2-1 openside structure doesn’t it?
But when you look closer, you see that something is a little off.
Kilcoyne is standing behind the screen with Hanrahan decoying ahead of the lead carrier.
What we’re actually looking at here is a disguised midfield pod of 3.
What’s the point of this? Well, I think it’s to extend the possibility of hitting that seam early in the game by activating Ben Arous.
The more defenders we activate in this line, the more likely we are to have moving defenders around the point of the next ruck.
Hiding the second Three Pod with Kilcoyne in the screen means that Racing overcommit a little on the initial shot at the ruck because in the moments prior to the ball coming out, Racing are pretty well numbered up but now, when we look at the next phase, we can see Munster attacking the seam with a Three Man pod.
This gives us real ruck security and all but guarantees quick ball for the next phase. Without that third man, this is a 4 on 2 forward-collision that would be prime position for a slow down over the ball. Instead, it’s solid possession and creates a moving defence around the ruck point.
If we play the end parts of the GIF in slow motion and track Kleyn (red #4) and Eddy Ben Arous (White #1 Blue Scrum Cap)
Lauret stays at the breakdown – dead on the play – while Ben Arous, Lauret and Palu are in motion around the ruck. That gives Hanrahan moving targets and those same defenders have to take contact from Kleyn passively on the next phase. Kilcoyne, a support forward on the last phase, has reset alongside Stander on the openside of this ruck.
That gives us a picture on the next phase that we really should have done better with. Our two most dynamic forward carriers were looking at a gapped Racing openside line with Farrell screened behind them.
The space between Lauret, Bird and Chat (with Tameifuna defending massive space in midfield) could have been attacked much smarter than it was in the end.
As the game developed against Racing into the second half we started to shift to a 2-3-2-1 and, for a while at least, it gave us a few different options.
This excellent carry from Kleyn put us in position to link to a Midfield Two pod off #10.
For me, this little structure actually achieved what we might well have been looking for at this moment but the pass leading onto O’Donoghue wasn’t what it needed to be.
I’d like this pass to lead O’Donoghue onto Chavancy at the seam but the pass is slightly inside him and that staggers him up before the contact. I’d like to see a little more aggression on this carry to get a more dominant centre-field ruck position for the next phase.
