Why Do Coaches insist on playing people out of position?

I don't know if anyone else is fed up with this, but I have really had it up to here with coaches performing experiments with players' positions.

Let's take a look at England:

Tom Wood is an absolutely cracking flanker. His performance against the ABs was very possibly the best performance by an English player since the 2003 RWC winning squad was knocking over SH teams regularly in 02/03. As an International No 8? Not a chance. Thomas Waldrom must be wondering what he has to do to get selected again. The back row would have been at least a bit more balanced.

Mike Brown: Quite possibly the best full back in the Premiership gets moved to wing to shoehorn him into the England team. This is because of Alex Goode being used as a potent attack weapon as first receiver. Ironically he didn't do this due to weather conditions and poor game management. He was shown up horribly in defence against Wales.

Courtney Lawes for all his bulk, bruising tackling and general toughness is NOT an International 6 as was badly shown up.

Manu Tuilagi is being touted as a potential wing. He does not have the pace.

In the past we've had the ridiculous Banahan experiment, Monye at fullback and Stevens playing at Loosehead when he was primarily a tighthead. None of these were effective. In other teams remember the disaster of playing Cullen at 13? Fofana on the wing? Michalak at 10 when he's playing his rugby at 9? Parra at 10 in the RWC Final? And of course there's Mauro Bergamasco at 9, the king of them all!

Tom Youngs has been a great addition to the EPS following his conversion from centre to hooker (although that's not really applicable here as this was done way before he burst into the full England squad) and Ben Foden is a pretty effective fullback rather than scrum-half, but once again, this wasn't due to the International coaches tinkering.

It very rarely works. Why do the coaches insist on it? And PLEASE can they stop it?

On the flip side Mike Phillips does a good job at 7, 8, 9 and 12 for the lions.
Tipuric can play 6-15.

Then again on the flip side I suppose neither Healey or Hook have really FOUND their preferred International position...

I call it lazy coaching, looking for quick solutions instead of looking to develop legitimate specialists in each position.

As far as Lancaster's concerned: I'm not convinced he fully understands the different roles the BR have to cover - altho he did get unlucky with injuries here. And his back 3 was constructed for defence and control (sad really, as Ashton doesn't tackle too well and Brown's positioning is sometimes suspect). If he puts Manu on the wing I'm gonna punch his lights out.

Often it works, the issue is when the coach fails to see the change doesn't work, and persists with the positional swap.

For example Roberts was switch from wing to centre by Gatland, and it worked a treat, before that he was a 15 as well.

Can't imagine Roberts as a 15. Do you mean he could actually step people then?

More seriously it was clear to the world and his wife that the Wood and Brown were massively under achieving when they were out of position. It's pretty worrying that neither were moved and specialists brought in, screams of Lancaster trying to play all his big names without understanding what the team actually requires.

Same with rushing Croft back and shoving Lawes to 6. And before that Farrel at 13.

Yep, sometimes the one disadvantage of having talent to choose from is you can't pick it all at once. At least not to any positive effect.

On the other hand sometimes it works.
They moved Keiran Reid from 6 to 8, Carter from 12 to 10, Umaga from 11 to 13, Kahui from 13 to 11, Jane from 15 to 14 and Larkham from 15 to 10 they worked out.

Sometimes the coach sees something in a player.

Perhaps it helps that all those guys were playing in successful teams where quality players could support them and help ease them in to their new positions and they areall great players them selves.

I have never been a fan of it but sometimes its out of neccessity, I hated it when Gatland insisted one playing James at t/head due to Jones being out injured rather than developing a replacement, likewise puttingHook at XV.

On the flip side most would saying Halfpenny is a wing but hes done a pretty damn good job at XV and Warburton proved he can play 6 at the top level as well as 7.

What will make it interesting is if Lydiate returns to his best form then he is our first choice No6 so what happens then between Tips and Warbs

bedfordwelsh wrote:

What will make it interesting is if Lydiate returns to his best form then he is our first choice No6 so what happens then between Tips and Warbs

Play Warbs at 8- obviously

Yappy, didnt Brown top the charts with metres made while playing on the wing? Hardly massively under-achieving. Dont think Brown is that bad an option on the wing however his lack of finishing ability is magnified when playing with Ashton and Goode.