THERE WERE PLENTY of involvements for Peter O’Mahony last weekend as Ireland lost the first Test.
He had 11 touches of the ball, making two carries and nine passes. He made nine tackles and slipped off one. There were two lineouts wins for O’Mahony and 13 ruck arrivals.
They’re not bad numbers for a 50-minute outing and yet, O’Mahony didn’t have a huge impact on the game.
Though he played a few nice passes, there were possibly times when he could have carried instead of distributing. His short pass to Joe McCarthy early on close to the Springboks’ tryline was straight at the Irish lock’s face and McCarthy knocked on trying to gather it.
There were no eye-catching moments in defence either. On his best days for Ireland, O’Mahony has usually come up with a highlight turnover but he didn’t compete at the defensive breakdown at all in Pretoria. His lineout steals have been a trademark over the years but there were none of those.
Coaches have always valued O’Mahony’s ability to be a ‘big moments’ player. He would often down the list of ball carriers or tacklers but could change the course of a game by producing one of his characteristic big plays. In truth, that has been less and less the case in 2024.
O’Mahony captained Ireland to a Six Nations title this year, a huge achievement and not something that should be undervalued. There is no doubting his leadership qualities, his ability to speak well to the squad, his tactical nous. Team-mates love playing with him. Yet his contribution purely as an individual in a physical and technical sense has faded.
O’Mahony is still operating at a high level but in the end, Andy Farrell’s decision to drop the Cork man to the bench for Saturday’s second Test against the Springboks doesn’t come as the explosive news that might be the case if other nations dropped their captains. It’s still a big call from Farrell, especially given new skipper Caelan Doris’ inexperience in that role, but the Ireland boss evidently felt he needed more oomph in his starting pack.
Second row James Ryan is the man backed to bring that physical edge, coming into the starting XV as Tadhg Beirne moves to blindside flanker, from where Farrell will hope Beirne can assault the South African breakdown and lineout as he is freed up from some of the nittier and grittier locking duties.
That change appears to make this a more powerful Irish pack and while the injured Dan Sheehan will obviously be missed, Rónan Kelleher is a big unit who has proven his ability to impact big Test matches. Key for Ireland will be nailing the lineout, which had issues again last weekend.
Farrell is asking O’Mahony to contribute strongly off the bench and while he’s not the most obvious ‘impact player,’ there are a few different ways to impact games. If it’s a tight battle, O’Mahony’s experience and decision-making will be handy to have on the pitch late on, while there’s no doubt he will be brimming with intent to make some of those trademark poaches and lineout steals.
It remains to be seen if this is an endpoint for 34-year-old O’Mahony with Ireland. His emotion before the final Six Nations game this year seemed to suggest that he was strongly considering retiring from Test rugby but Farrell wanted him to stay on as skipper for this tour of South Africa.
O’Mahony’s contract with Munster and the IRFU covers next season and he has only recently spoken about his desire to keep playing in the green jersey.
For now, 106-times capped O’Mahony is still part of this bid to win a Test on South African soil for only the second time in Irish rugby history.
Ryan was good off the bench for Ireland last weekend and he is a trusted performer at the highest level, bringing 63 caps worth of Test experience into the mix. His physicality that could be key.
Many times for Ireland and Leinster, it has been Ryan who has led the aggression, playing close to the edge with some of his rucking and tackling.
Speaking yesterday, Ireland defence coach Simon Easterby repeatedly mentioned how they need to do a better job of winning the collisions, strongly suggesting that Farrell and co. felt that didn’t happen enough in the first Test in Pretoria.
Ryan isn’t a behemoth when compared to some locks in the international game but he hits as hard as most of them.
Easterby’s strong defence of Doris’ dealings with referee Luke Pearce in the first Test after O’Mahony had been replaced makes even more sense now.
Ireland know Doris will lead by example again on Saturday but his biggest challenge will be that interaction with referee Karl Dickson. Doris will be looking for a good balance of getting the right calls and shutting up at the right time.
Bundee Aki misses out on the matchday 23 after a bruising evening in the first Test, with Garry Ringrose coming into the midfield in his place, while Robbie Henshaw has come through the head injury protocols to start alongside his Leinster team-mate.
Farrell will speak to the media this evening to provide more detail on these decisions but he has made a big call that sees his skipper dropping from the starting XV as Ireland look to finish their season on a major high.
