backrower8 wrote:wixfjord wrote:Doris looks to my untrained eye a better bet as an 8 than Deegan, who was quiet.
It is still too early (forwards aged 20 & 22,with 18 months between them) To my trained eye the opposite is the case. Deegan has exceptional moves and hands and a knack for scoring tries that will benefit a team the more touches he gets. That points to 8. Whereas Doris has more power which also suits 6.
I was surprised to see that this is the first time that the coaches have selected a backrow with both players starting - Deegan at N6 and Doris at No8. I thought this had happened before, but it turns out that when Doris has been selected as a starter, it has been with Deegan in the No20 jersey: @ Cardiff, vs Ospreys, @ Dragons, vs Connacht.
Deegan has actually played in lots more games than Doris this season: 14 [6+8/587 mins] compared to 8 [5+3/431 mins]. It's not like he has been sidelined in the same manner as Peter Dooley was last year [2+7 for 285 mins]. It's pragmatic to assume that they will both continue to be heavily involved over the next two months and then their appearances will drop off as Ruddock, Conan, O'Brien come back into the mix following the Six Nations.
However, the Deegan/Doris scenario is the one topic over any others I'd like to sit down and discuss with the coaches to hear their thinking on the subject. To me, Doris has the tools to play No6
and No8, whereas Deegan doesn't fit the mould of a typical blindside at all and isn't all that effective when he plays there. That doesn't mean that Deegan is a worse player than Doris - Josh van der Flier is a super openside, but you wouldn't play him at No8. Rugby is a game with numerous positional quirks.
It'd make more sense to me to prioritise selection of Deegan at No8 and Doris at No6 [somewhat at the expense of Josh Murphy, it must be said] in terms of progressing both players along complementary lines rather than one at the expense of another. I think the coaches have needlessly created a 'quarterback controversy' over the backup No8 position.
When you look at the depth chart at backrow purely in terms of starts [rather than appearances or minutes], it actually seems quite incoherent after the first rank:
No8: Conan [9 starts/673 mins]; Doris [5 starts/365 mins]; Deegan [3 starts/204 mins]; O'Brien [2 starts/119 mins]; Leavy [1 start/54 mins]
No7: van der Flier [10 starts/679 mins]; Leavy [4 starts/320 mins]; Penny [4 starts/303 mins]; Ruddock [2 starts/160 mins]
No6: Ruddock [9 starts/633 mins]; Murphy [6 starts/350 mins]; Deegan [3 starts/235 mins]; Leavy [1 start/80 mins]; O'Brien [1 start/61 mins]
Conan, JVDF and Rhys are out front at their respective positions - given this season's form and fitness, few would argue with that. Next up are Doris at No8, Leavy at openside and Josh Murphy at blindside ... not a combination that many on the board would suggest as Leinster's second string backrow. From a choice of the remaining players, it'd be Deegan at No8, Leavy at No7 and O'Brien at No6 for me. It's also strange for me to see Deegan as our nominal third choice blindside, because I don't believe that he has a future in the position. Doris hasn't started a single game at blindside, which again strikes me as odd.
As an aside, it's interesting to see that Leavy has started games in all three positions this season, and that Sean O'Brien hasn't started at No7 [his nominal position] at all. When we needed a No8 for the away fixture against Wasps, we skipped two players on our depth chart [Doris and Deegan] to bring in O'Brien.