James Ryan: 'Irish teams are at their very best when we're on the edge'

England come to Dublin for a Six Nations opener on Saturday. 

BEST ON THE EDGE: James Ryan believes Irish teams are at their very best when they are on the edge. Pic: Brendan Moran/Sportsfile

If Ireland are to give themselves a chance of retaining their Guinness Six Nations crown for a third consecutive year over the next eight weeks, James Ryan believes they will have to play right on the edge.

With England arriving in Dublin this Saturday, championship credentials will be thoroughly tested on the opening weekend with Simon Easterby in interim charge while Andy Farrell takes control of preparations for this summer’s British & Irish Lions tour to Australia.

Farrell bowed out temporarily following November’s Autumn Nations Series in which Ireland lost to the month’s first visitors to Aviva Stadium, New Zealand, but rallied to beat Argentina, Fiji and Australia in successive weeks. Having been the envy of world rugby in terms of low penalty counts and limited yellow cards, Ireland’s 2024 campaigns were characterised by a less fastidious approach to discipline, conceding more than 10 penalties in six of their 11 Tests and having a player sin-binned in all but three of those matches.

Ireland lock Ryan believes there is a balance to be struck on that disciplinary tightrope but insisted his side would continue to “push the boundaries”.

“If you’re not playing on the edge at this level, that's just not going to go too well for you,” the 67-cap forward said at Ireland’s warm-weather Six Nations preparation camp in Portugal.

“It's just getting the balance right and trying to take those ones away that we don't need to give away out of our game but I think Irish teams are at their very best when we're on the edge.

“We definitely want to push the boundaries and for us, it's getting the balance right between the avoidable and the unavoidable penalties. Sometimes when you play on the edge, you're going to give penalties away that are unavoidable.

“We don't want to take that license away from us to get after a team physically. But then there's the avoidable ones likes offsides or playing the nine, little ones that we don't necessarily need to give away and that put us under pressure. So trying to cut out the avoidable ones is a big thing for us this month."

Ryan credited the province’s Champions Cup pool stages for helping to get Ireland’s players up to Test-level intensity and the second row was front and centre in Leinster’s crucial wins earlier this month at La Rochelle and home to Bath.

“They’ve been very important. A couple of the games we’ve played recently stick out, like that La Rochelle one away. Games at the top end of Champions Cup and Test matches, there’s not really much difference really, they’re pretty similar.

“So coming into this having a lot of the squad involved in big games, obviously Munster are the same, they had a tough game against Saracens, I think will have us in good stead for the next few weeks.” 

Ryan’s current form was a source of great satisfaction for Ireland forwards coach Paul O’Connell, who on Friday said: “Even this morning we showed (development squad back-rower) James McNabney an image of James Ryan lineout jumping and his drill and how he’s gone about delivering that. I think his carry this year has been the best it’s been in a long time. When he came on to the scene first he carried a lot of ball, it probably wasn’t as structured as it is now but I think his carry this year has been excellent.

“His tackle for the last two years has been in a phenomenal place in terms of his collision winning and in terms of his height for a tall man. He’s held in high regard by the group, he doesn’t say a lot, James, but when he speaks he’s very accurate.

“He’s playing really well and he has to, it’s a really competitive position.” Ryan agreed his form has improved from this time last year and said: “I'm feeling good. I don’t know if I'm suddenly playing well, I’d like to think I was playing pretty well towards the end of last season as well when I go back from my bicep (injury), but yeah, I feel I'm in a good place.

“We've had a number of big games with Leinster over the last few weeks that haven't come easy either and that we've had to dig in and grind out wins. So I think we all kind of feel, hopefully, it's a little bit more battle hardened coming into this campaign than maybe we did in November.” The 28-year-old also explained his enhanced ball carrying cited by O’Connell.

“It's fun, it's very different from the nuts and bolts of being a lock.

"I've invested a bit of time into it the last few months. I guess it has been a conscious thing, a fair bit of extras on-pitch post-session and so on. Then off off-pitch, (Leinster assistant coach and former Ireland and Lions back-rower) Sean O'Brien has been great for me.

“We've done a bit of work around different things. Obviously, he was such a good carrier when he played so it's been useful to have some conversations with him and he's given me a few cues that I've tried to work with and I think have worked well for me.” 

Ryan added: “There's so much competition there now, both with Leinster and Ireland, you have to really invest in your own game and think about how you can push it on. So, I absolutely think it's been good for me.”