Pete's Analysis for Test 2. (What do the Lions have to do to win)

First topic message reminder :

Hi everyone,

I have just completed a relatively detailed but compact analysis of the how the Lions can win the game on Saturday. hope people find it interesting/useful. This is what I would change for the second test having watched the first test back and seen some pretty tasty analysis on it, which I have included just below.

http://www.greenandgoldrugby.com/wallabies-attack-opportunities-in-the-first-test/
http://www.greenandgoldrugby.com/wallabies-v-lions-set-piece-contest/

First of all it is hard to argue with that analysis at all, in particular the Wallabies attacking opportunities, JOC is a great player but as this piece demonstrates his vision and or decision making were not good on many an occasion. You can obviously forgive him taking different options at points and he did at times really excite, and create but the sheer number of opportunities he missed will stand against him.

The Lions did very well in many aspects of play last week but they will be weaker this week and also I think Deans and Co, will have seen a number of Lions weaknesses. On to my own analysis which I have summed up in 5 pretty simple points, here they are in short with the expanded and more detailed analysis below that.

1. Play Ben Youngs over Philips.
2. Play Sean O'Brien over Croft.
3. Vary/adapt our use of the lineout and our use of the scrum.
4. Using "blind back3" plays, create confusion in their inexperienced midfield on our ball.
5. Slow the rush defense to limit the space outside.


1) The pace at which we play
Why? Mainly for style reasons rather than Philips having a bad game. I thought Philips was ill-suited to playing the Aussies before the tour began but due to his serious form I didn't feel that he endangered us greatly as he was red-hot. However, he really messed us up on Saturday.

He is perfectly designed to tying in defenders and releasing others into what I call "confined space" (the defensive line is further up - therefore you are further from the gainline but there are a few less defenders to deal with - immediately.) On Saturday the Aussies didn't drift off Philips the way he needed them too. Not once. They came up as an entire line from fringe defense to the wing and were aggressive in it.

Add to that his service being slower and we saw Sexton sitting deeper and deeper and indeed having to create something further from the gainline or kicking (he kicked very well). There were times when the ball was available and Philips was not even present to pass it, frequently Sky cameramen waited looking at the ruck for Mike to trot up a few seconds later. Simply inexcusable in my opinion. I play 9 and every 10 I have played with say they would prefer a bad pass sent quickly than a good pass delayed.

Finally, how did Philips kick? Well, let's just say we were lucky that the Aussie counter was not very Aussie like, as Mike kicked far too far with little height, very few of his kicks were contestable.

Youngs on the other hand offers speed of thought, a bit of vision and most importantly speed to the breakdown. If he can get the ball away quickly that immediately means that it will be that bit easier for Sexton and the rest of the team to get on to and then over the gainline. He may not be perfect but he can get us going forward which is going to be more difficult without O'Connell (I'll get to this later). The main thing about Youngs is, that while he may not be in such excellent form as Philips is/was, his style is suited to playing Australia where as Mike's is not.

2) Re-balancing the power
O'Connell is gone. What did he offer? Oustanding leadership, confident lineout calling, power in the maul/ruck/pick and go. How do we combat this?
I would make one unenforced change. Parling has come in to the starting team (Jenkins let this one slip yesterday), he is a bit of a work-a-holic and is a good lineout operator, he was asked to captain the midweek team so overall I am not too worried about the lineout (more on this later) and while we are missing huge leadership Parling offers some (more than Gray/Evans). What Parling probably won't do is getting us moving forward. The Lions found getting over the advantage line pretty tricky on Saturday no two way about it, the gainline success rate was not too bad but it was how far they got over it which was the issue, the answer, not very far. We gained 100 less metres than they did with 10% more possession. Not good. The one unenforced change I would make is that I would put SOB in at blindside flanker. Croft had a very good game but unfortunately, outside of the lineout was relatively ineffective. SOB showed versus the rebels that he has the alround game to be involved in this test team from the start. He can

• get us on the front foot, both in the narrow channels and the wider ones, while sucking in defenders that few others can
  

• win lineout ball at the tail (he did this three times against the Rebels)
  

• he can win us ball on the floor and slow it up
  

If Manu Tuilagi was ready to come in to the test team (Rebels game showed he isn't quite there yet) or Roberts was fit (he won't be by all accounts) then I would start Lydiate as the 12 (Roberts/Manu) can get us over the gainline while Lydiate adds power to the tighter exchanges (mainly ruck).

So the loss of POC resulted in a loss of...

1. lineout ability (Parling can cover this and SOB is an option at tail - check)
   

• leadership (Parling is a good leader albeit not the same ilk, also worth saying if POC was fit Faletau would be in line to start but Heaslip is another leader that the Lions need whereas Toby is not - check)
  

• power (SOB offers that immense physicality and can arguably get us going forward more than POC can, his choke tackles and technique on the floor also mean that we can stop/slow the Aussies - check)
  

3) Winning the ball on our set piece
This is about to get much harder. If as I expect we go with the same backline (hopefully with Youngs) as last week then we need to make some changes to our tactics in the set piece. Let's start with the lineout:
As can be seen in the link at the top of the page, the Wallabies effectively let us have front of the lineout ball. They hardly challenged that area of the throw, where Croft and Heaslip won some good easy ball. The Wallabies will start to challenge this area more, but still not as much as the back or the middle the reason for this is simple: when you win front of the lineout ball the 9 has to pass further to get the ball to the 10 meaning the defense has more time to push up and the tail of the defensive lineout can push into midfield too. Not ideal from an attacking perspective. While our lineout will be weaker without Croft and POC I don't anticipate it being that much weaker but I do expect the Wallabies to contest more. I do not think gambling to the back more than we did is a clever idea, however I think we should change what we are doing at the front of the lineout. Why don't we try some of these...?

1. Why not a quick ball back to the hooker and try to attack the 5metre channel, not sure if anyone noticed but Youngs was one of our best carriers in the tight and with Ben Youngs in there too, he is quick enough to get away down that small space (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0E90-qleLMU)
   

• Why not set a dummy maul and set up another beside it, so the ball comes down and is transferred towards the middle of the lineout where the maul is set but the defense are expecting it where the actual catch was made, this is a Leinster favourite
  

• Why not drop the men at the back of the lineout have them receive the ball and then have our massive blindside winger powering on their inside and possibly Davies powering in on their outside, a three pronged attack as it were
  

• Why not try and get Ben Youngs (or another forward in to the line somewhere) look at this (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=13BCoGQUAMc) around 9minutes in.
  We have also seen Gray move to the back of the lineout all on his own so the defense think he is a dummy, catch the ball and then feed inside to a scrumhalf (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zyEy7pbIW1s) at 44 seconds. This is done at the back but could be done in the middle too in a 5 man lineout.
  

What of the scrum? This is going to be messy IMO, I think the Wallabies will have a real advantage here in the second test. There was only one scrum really where the Lions embarrassed the Aussies and now missing Corbiserio and O'Connell we could lose out here. In terms of selection, do you trust Vunipola or keep his for impact and try Grant (who has not looked great on either of his Lions games). I am not sure to be honest. Is Parling going to give as much grunt to the scrum? I don't think so but who else will? Evans probably is the best bet for this maybe? I would suggest that the Lions forfeit this as an attacking weapon (for penalties) and try to get the ball in and out ASAP on the first few scrums to assess how they get on. I definitely would not wait around for the ball to see if we get a shove on, as I think it is more likely that they will. Heaslip and the 9 ( Youngs) will need to be on top form here as Genia will try to slow them down a fair bit.

4) Having the ball is fun, lets have fun
The Lions did not really get to execute many nice set plays apart from the Cuthbert try which was very tasty.
One thing to note, the Lions are certainly not faster than the Wallbies. Simple as, they have more pace than we do more a less straight across from 9-15 but what they don't have is experienced combinations. With this in mind I would target the defensive decision making of the Wallabies particularly in the 10-12, 12-13, 13-wing channels. Here are some examples I would use off early phase possession which are labelled as invisible back3 plays. The Lions have massive wingers who run good lines so the idea is to insert them in the line and have the midfield create diversions to put doubt in the oppositions minds as to who they are supposed to mark. These dummy runs create the space that should see North and Cuthbert/Bowe through the gaps.

1. 10 plays a dummy switch with 12, 13 has drifted very wide, blindside winger comes off the 10s outside shoulder through the 12/13 gap
   

• run a screen off 12. So, 10 straight to 12 who begins to drift, 13 drifts further and stays deep, openside winger comes from out to in flat.
  

• run a simple 10-12 wrap/loop, 13 comes from out to in off 12, the option is to hit 13, hit the 10 on the wrap or hit the blindside winger who is coming hard from the inside straight into the 10/12 channel.
  

• 10 plays a dummy switch with 12, 13 is coming hard from out to in while the blindside winger is coming around from deep, this leaves a 3 on 2 on the outside with our dangerous back3 in possession.
  

• an overload move. Best off left side scrum. 10 gets the ball and has the option of hitting 11 on switch, 15 outside him coming out to in, 12 outside 15 and slightly ahead of coming out to in, or the 13 who is flat and drifting. To exploit more space the 14 is a cross kick option.
  

5) How to defend against Gold dust?
As the analysis I posted at the top confirms, Andy Farrell is leaving a lot of space outwide in the Lions defense and is asking Halfpenny to do a lot of covering work. The Lions were excellent at getting off the line quickly and allowing the Wallabies as few gainline successes as possible, they were really effective in this regard. However (as cited in the analysis posted at the top of this piece) the Lions left huge spaces between their wingers and the touchline. Ok, this is using the touchline as an extra defender and forcing the Aussies to prove that they have the skills to pass it out wide (something JOC and Moore didn't appreciate at times). I imagine that this Saturday the Lions will be tested considerably more on this front. JOC did not recognise the space often enough or exploit it at all really, that will change this week.

In a nut shell we are big and they are fast. If you did it man for man you would get the Lions being stronger and the Aussies faster in most positions. So my question is: why is Farrell having us blitz off the line? We are big enough and good enough to defend their direct plays easily enough without having to fly off the line, exposing us further wide. The Aussies are quicker than us so while we are using the touchline as our friend, I don't think we are getting close enough to it. If we come up a little less quickly we will be able to stop their direct plays effectively still but we will also be able to drift and close down the space left on our outside for their very dangerous back 3.

Sexton-Davies-BOD were close to rock solid when it came to midfield attack but BOD (like Halfpenny) was being asked to cover a lot of ground and saved our bacon a few times, if the whole team drifts together after the Wallabies pass it then we will find considerably easier to stop the likes of Folau, Beale and JOC getting in to those very dangerous spaces.


6) So all in all...
....I think the Aussies will win on Saturday. I think the loss of Corbs and POC are going to really tell. There is not much we can do about these losses other than put in our next best guys and try to balance the things we lose in the pack.

There are ways to beat this Aussie team and I would say discipline is the main one. If we can keep coming around the corner (Gatland) and get Youngs feeding guys like O'Brien, Heaslip, Tom Youngs and Grant quickly then I would say we have a good chance. If Sexton can vary the play and exploit the inexperienced guys he is up against while kicking like he did in Test1 then I'd say we are nearly there.

The issue is going to be the scrum and the breakdown. POC does so much work at the breakdown and I'm not sure Parling will be the influence there that we need (another reason for SOB over Croft) so all in all I think the Aussies will dominate that aspect a little more than they did in Test 1. Also in the lineout, the loss of POC (and Croft to a lesser extent) is a blow, POC calls lineouts which is what we will miss him for most rather than the actual catching and jumping. But more importantly, I think that the Wallabies have us pretty sussed in that area. I think they will be competing a lot more and will have a defensive system in place for when we try to play front of the lineout ball. I can see both set pieces being a bad place for the Lions on Saturday.

I hope you enjoyed the analysis and I am sure many people disagree with it and I'm really looking forward to hearing the differing opinions. Have a great day folks.

Buachaill

I agree with Pete, I think we'll lose. I think Youngs will start and improve things but we'll still lose. Butwe still have some pretty special players like Bowe, O'Brien, Tipuric, Gray, Tuilangi etc. who'll be quite fresh and will enable Gatland to completely change things for the deciding test.

ps
Best article ever.

sensisball wrote:Grant is a much more assured scrummager and given that mako was brought on tour as the impact loosehead, the fact that Grant is the fifth choice player for the shirt shouldnt alter this reality. He isnt ready to start a Lions test whereas Grant is.
If the Aussies face Mako from the start they will be able to earn field position, from penalties, and assuming their kickers have proper boots on, a fair few points as well!
It must be Grant to start.

The thing is mate (and ok we are a tad biased but not much!!) but Grants form pre, during, and post-6Ns certainly was certainly better than 5th choice Lions selection. Scot v Wales and moreso Glasgow v Ospreys saw Ryan better Adam Jones in the scrum amongst many more fine performances. He is more than able to justify a start for the 2nd test.

5th choice loosehead really shouldn't be starting.

Grant has done ok but nothing special. He's a decent (at best) back up. I'd have preferred James or Sheridan.

Cyril wrote:5th choice loosehead really shouldn't be starting.

Grant has done ok but nothing special. He's a decent (at best) back up. I'd have preferred James or Sheridan.

Nice one Cyril nice one son...............I'm forever blowing bubbles............keepy up mate........... jumpers for goal posts...................

Never mind one day you will realise you keep looking for the footy section

put your bleeding gogs on fellaaaar

Nice one CYYYYYYRIL
LETSSSSSS hav anurver one!!!

bsando wrote:Great read!

Thanks bsando

maestegmafia wrote:Excellent post Pete, thanks for your time and effort... having a good read, the contributions are very good too... Glad to see so many people share opinions.

Cheers maestegmafia

Feckless Rogue wrote:I agree with Pete, I think we'll lose. I think Youngs will start and improve things but we'll still lose. Butwe still have some pretty special players like Bowe, O'Brien, Tipuric, Gray, Tuilangi etc. who'll be quite fresh and will enable Gatland to completely change things for the deciding test.

ps
Best article ever.

Aww you! Shucks!

Alright gents, we now have a very serious problem.

Mako is in at loosehead from the start.

I can see what Gatland tried to do I guess, he is incorporating Mako's strength to getting us over the gainline while Lydiate is going to be the ruck securer that POC was in the first test. Makes sense no?

No.

The fact that we could/will (delete as appropriate) be conceding penalties at scrum time leads the Aussies to gain

1) great first phase ball if they want it
2) possession (no idea how dangerous that is - we had 55% in Test1)
3) the ability to go down the line (gains territory and our lineout is weaker than last week)

Gentlemen I worry about this move, I worry a lot. I think this is really going to be a get the ball in and out in lightening speed time, Tom hooking better than he has ever hooked (maybe thomond could give us a low down on this???) and Ben Youngs feeding the second rows in an attempt to make the scrum last for as few seconds as possible!

In a way I am glad Bowe is back, if nothing else it gives us some variety, while also some impact in Cuthbert. Futhermore he has a better kicking game than North/Cuthbert so Sexton may not have to drift back as often this time around.

Having no lock cover for this test is a foolish and dangerous move. Losing either AWJ or Parling and defeat is a certainty.

Also our lack of cover across the backline is also a concern.

Yeah agree, particularly with such a de-stabalised scrum. I suppose Gatland wants to have the option of getting mobility on to the pitch if he needs it (and I think he will) but he is sacrificing a lot of power. 

What is Croft like at loosehead lock scrummaging? If AWJ goes down then we are going to be felter-weight in that category.

If we need to chase a game in the last 15 though it may be a good move??

It kind of hamstrings our area of greatest strength though. Even before the tour we knew we could probably dominate the set piece.

If we get some injuries early on in this game that advantage is negated.

This is Las Vegas rugby, rolling the dice and hoping for the best.

A couple of other thoughts:

I listened to an assessment from one of the Reds coaching staff. His feeling was that the Lions struggled to cope with the pace of the game in a number of matches. Not so much from a fitness perspective but from a decision making making perspective. I felt the Lions dropped off towards the end of the 1st test. One of easy areas to fix is defence against quickly taken free kicks.

The other issue that strikes me is the wallabies kicking game and attacking options. They again start with 2 flyhalves but have beale at full back. This should give them more options on attack and a much better kicking game. Cover defence could be the key.

RuggerRadge2611 wrote:It kind of hamstrings our area of greatest strength though. Even before the tour we knew we could probably dominate the set piece.

If we get some injuries early on in this game that advantage is negated.

This is Las Vegas rugby, rolling the dice and hoping for the best.

Rugger-
I'm pretty sure we have already lost that advantage. I can only see our scrum gaining parity with a stretch of my imagination. I think we have just conceded that set piece, unless Gatland/Rowntree has an ace up a sleeve.

pete (buachaill on eirne) wrote:Alright gents, we now have a very serious problem.

Mako is in at loosehead from the start.

I can see what Gatland tried to do I guess, he is incorporating Mako's strength to getting us over the gainline while Lydiate is going to be the ruck securer that POC was in the first test. Makes sense no?

No.

The fact that we could/will (delete as appropriate) be conceding penalties at scrum time leads the Aussies to gain

1) great first phase ball if they want it
2) possession (no idea how dangerous that is - we had 55% in Test1)
3) the ability to go down the line (gains territory and our lineout is weaker than last week)

Gentlemen I worry about this move, I worry a lot. I think this is really going to be a get the ball in and out in lightening speed time, Tom hooking better than he has ever hooked (maybe thomond could give us a low down on this???) and Ben Youngs feeding the second rows in an attempt to make the scrum last for as few seconds as possible!

In a way I am glad Bowe is back, if nothing else it gives us some variety, while also some impact in Cuthbert. Futhermore he has a better kicking game than North/Cuthbert so Sexton may not have to drift back as often this time around.

Presuming you mean throwing in, Lions won all their ball on Saturday but at a cost to the backs as it was all at two and four. There are still some timing issues, to be found and that only comes with more comes but I onyl remember it happening twice. Lineout in my opinion is really all about chemistry and timing. You need to develop a relationship with your jumpers like a quarterback and his receivers, everybody needs to be on the same page for timing, most other problems result from lack of confidence I think If you get to the professional and international level in reality there isn't a large amount of difference between different motions or performance or anything like that, it would be of a common enough standard. (I can't post an image to explain my poitn as no hotlinking is allowed from Balls, but there's a small bit about it in the article: http://balls.ie/rugby/tale-of-the-tape-lions-kicking-and-set-piece-in-the-first-test/)


Some of the changes were enforced but I'm surprised with several others, unless they are going to completely change their style of play, then the team isn't really suited to play "the Wales way", they only really have two big carriers in the pack, and Davies did a lot of good things at the weekend did really break the gainline consistently

Thanks Thom. I actually meant hooking in the scrum is there any way of getting it out quicker that Youngs should be doing considering the scrum could well be going backwards quick enough?

Re: lineout-
Completely agree re: timing etc and also I think footwork is seriously underrated here. It does suck for Best however as he just seems to have really lost his throw, be it not straight or overthrown etc.  Do you expect the Lions to stick with the front of the lineout ball?

To be honest half the time the ball gets thrown to the second row so unless you absolutely pulverize the opposition (this won't happen with Vunipola one think, but we won't be killed here either), you won't really get it back that much quicker. At times on Saturday, the ball was there and the Lions were messing around with it.


I think they might go with an "if it ain't broke don't fix it view" which I think is the wrong way to go about it. They're padding the stats in a lot of ways by doing it. A couple of lost balls is worth getting good ball for the backs. Footwork is massively improtant to second rows, that's why training will involve ladder work at underage and other quick feet drills (this is an area where other sports methods could be adopted more)

Ben Youngs will be putting in to his brother (or preferably to Parling) in the scrume so we should have something of an understanding there - With Hibbard, Grant and Cole on the bench there is sufficient power.
 
 
 
I believe Cuthbert is the 2nd row cover on the bench

Pete, you already posted that you thought Grant had put in two poor displays - wrong, against the Rebels his scrummaging and general play was good, average player rating >7 from a large number of sources. Admittedly he was part of a front five that lost to the Brumbies, but I wouldn't read much into that for a number of reasons: 1 Stevens was at loosehead, 2 The whole team knew they weren't playing in the first test and produced a fairly lax display 3 you can ignore Grant's performances for the rest of the season

I just don't think he has played that well and I thought he should have toured cos I like him so much. He had another 'meh' game on Tuesday I thought, he dropped so many balls and I'd consider him pretty good with ball in hand normally.

I'd have started him for this one just because he is a bit more solid in the scrum than Mako.

Thom-
I'm not sure the Lions want to risk losing possession on their own throw. The Aussies are class at playing off that turnover ball when the back3 are all over the place. I can see why they want to play safe anyway, but I think they need to experiment more in this test.

RubyGuby wrote:Ben Youngs will be putting in to his brother (or preferably to Parling) in the scrume so we should have something of an understanding there - With Hibbard, Grant and Cole on the bench there is sufficient power.
 
 
 
I believe Cuthbert is the 2nd row cover on the bench

That makes sense - after all Croft can cover center/wing

pete (buachaill on eirne) wrote:I just don't think he has played that well and I thought he should have toured cos I like him so much. He had another 'meh' game on Tuesday I thought, he dropped so many balls and I'd consider him pretty good with ball in hand normally.

I'd have started him for this one just because he is a bit more solid in the scrum than Mako.

Thom-
I'm not sure the Lions want to risk losing possession on their own throw. The Aussies are class at playing off that turnover ball when the back3 are all over the place. I can see why they want to play safe anyway, but I think they need to experiment more in this test.

Dropped two balls, one of which was off a fairly ropey pass - and yet you're happy to ignore carries, scrummaging, rucks hit, a lineout steal, tackles, etc - odd

It just seems like an Andy Robinson selection, being a Scot we have a unique perspective on guys picking teams to make sure there is room for their favourites.

Guys who are specialists in their position, playing well and in form (Gray, Evans, Tuilagi, Hogg, Maitland) getting ignored so the favourites (Croft, Lydiate, Cuthbert) can be rolled out.

It's a shame.

aslongas-

I was calling for Grant to start. On current form Mako is better imo but is more of an impact sub.