Ulster Bank League profiles: Lansdowne restock their charges ahead of big season

“Once the scrum goes unopposed it’s like a game of rugby league. I’m an old fashioned boy from the Welsh coal-mining towns so the scrum was the platform and that differentiated the game more than anything. I would like to see a directive that you’d have two specialist props and a hooker on the bench.”

‘How many times have you seen the top teams overturned by the bottom teams?’ is the question posed by Mike Ruddock, Lansdowne’s director of rugby.

A time-served rugby man long before he masterminded Wales’ glorious Grand Slam triumph in 2005, Ruddock held a head coach post with Worcester Warriors before coming to Ireland in 2011 to coach Lansdowne and Ireland U20s.