{"id":270030,"date":"2026-01-29T11:36:11","date_gmt":"2026-01-29T11:36:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/270030\/"},"modified":"2026-01-29T11:36:11","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T11:36:11","slug":"the-buck-stops-with-caelan-doris-as-he-says-ireland-must-improve-discipline-in-six-nations-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/270030\/","title":{"rendered":"The buck stops with Caelan Doris as he says Ireland must improve discipline in Six Nations \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

The buck stops with Caelan Doris<\/a>. His words, Andy Farrell\u2019s too. Not verbatim but in sentiment. The context is a discussion about discipline, penalty counts and the breakdown. The brief back and forth between Ireland captain and head coach is delivered with smiles, and a promise that it would be a topic on the flight from Edinburgh to Portugal.<\/p>\n

Resilience of the Rorke\u2019s Drift variety couldn\u2019t mask or mitigate the self-inflicted body blows in Ireland\u2019s defeat to South Africa in November: 18 penalties, five cards. Not that there\u2019s any attempt to gloss over it. In discussing Ireland\u2019s prospects ahead of their opening match in the Six Nations against France in Paris next Thursday, it was front and centre as a legacy issue.<\/p>\n

Irish discipline in last year\u2019s tournament was pretty good; in November it was markedly substandard. Everyone\u2019s accountable in the drive to improve, but as captain it\u2019s a little more pointed. Doris understands the dynamic. In an ideal world it\u2019s as much, \u201cdo as I do, as do as I say\u201d. He\u2019s working towards that goal.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m aware that an area of my game that I\u2019ve put a lot of focus on is breakdown decision-making, but I haven\u2019t been good enough there in the last while, certainly November and probably since then at times as well. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve had some good chats with the coaches off the back of that, and I know that\u2019s an area I need to lead and improve, so I\u2019ve been working on that. It hasn\u2019t necessarily come to fruition yet.\u201d<\/p>\n

The vexed issue of what\u2019s permissible at the breakdown can be reliant on communication between the referee and players.<\/p>\n

\u201cI mean it\u2019s different referee to referee,\u201d Doris explained. \u201cSome are more willing to coach.<\/p>\n

\"RefereeReferee Eoghan Cross speaks to Leinster’s Caelan Doris. Photograph: Nick Elliott\/Inpho <\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s obviously quite a bit of grey in rugby, especially around the breakdown, so some will coach a little bit more, some less so. But like we\u2019d always say, it\u2019s based on the habits you build in training and [transferring] that on to the pitch, being good decision-makers, taking the referee out of the game as much as possible and showing good pictures.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s a little bit like what we were saying there around not being able to control the laws, you can\u2019t control what the refs are going to do, you can control what we\u2019re going to do, so focus on that.\u201d<\/p>\n

There\u2019s an element of having to be philosophical but not necessarily rigorous. There\u2019s an element of gambling required. Head down and carry on. <\/p>\n

\u201cGet on with it,\u201d Doris continued. \u201cDo what we can do, play within the laws as best as possible. I agree with some of what Beirney [Tadhg Beirne] said around it\u2019s not necessarily favouring the best attacking game at the minute or the best watch from some perspectives, but it is what it is, so just get on with it.\u201d<\/p>\n

His role as captain also sees him check in on new caps in the squad like Nathan Doak, Edwin Edogbo and Bill Bohan. It\u2019s about providing a welcoming, supportive environment, so the players can feel comfortable and crack on with their work.<\/p>\n

\u201cYeah, just conversation with them, largely is the way to go about it, I think,\u201d Doris explained. \u201cAs that organically unfolds, hopefully you can dive a little bit deeper and get to know how things work for them, what sort of a personality they are and how to help them as best as possible.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhile it\u2019s not one-size-fits-all, there\u2019s also commonalities and ways that we do things, so getting them up to scratch at the level that we operate correctly as well, regardless of how it works for them [is important].\u201d<\/p>\n

He played against Edogbo in the recent URC match and was asked for his impressions of the young secondrow.<\/p>\n

\u201cI think he\u2019s been very good. He\u2019s physical, obviously, but he\u2019s skilful as well. He seems to have good game understanding and awareness.<\/p>\n

\u201cHe\u2019s a big fellah, capable of putting a stamp on the game, even though Munster will be disappointed with how they\u2019ve gone in Europe. But I think he\u2019s been a standout in some of their games.<\/p>\n

\u201cLike Faz [Farrell] is saying around coming into camp, messages have already gone in around getting him up to scratch early. Quite a bit of detail coming in; it can be a little bit overwhelming from that point of view, but there\u2019s plenty of guys who can get an arm around him and help him bring out his best.\u201d<\/p>\n

The sunshine of the Algarve will uplift spirits as well as warm the bones. As bulk contributors to the Lions Tour, the tariff was a slightly undercooked or disjointed performance against New Zealand in Chicago in the opening game of the November series. Injuries notwithstanding, everyone else is in a better fettle.<\/p>\n

\u201cNot to make an excuse, but some of us were a little bit raw coming back in then,\u201d Doris said. \u201cThe best way to improve how you\u2019re playing is by playing, so hopefully we\u2019ll see that come to fruition. \u201cIt\u2019s such a good time of year. Coming back into a fresh environment in Portugal, a few new faces, and France on Thursday night sharpens the mind as well. I think if you look back at the last couple of years, we\u2019ve been pretty good in how we\u2019ve prepared.<\/p>\n

\u201cLess so for New Zealand, but it\u2019s just about doing the right thing and treating training as close to games as possible and bringing the right habits and the right attitude each day.\u201d <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The buck stops with Caelan Doris. His words, Andy Farrell\u2019s too. Not verbatim but in sentiment. The context…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":270031,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[25747,28581,132379,1452,61,60,1449,15551,112,58217],"class_list":{"0":"post-270030","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-andy-farrell","9":"tag-caelan-doris","10":"tag-edwin-edogbo","11":"tag-france-rugby","12":"tag-ie","13":"tag-ireland","14":"tag-ireland-rugby","15":"tag-six-nations","16":"tag-sports","17":"tag-tadhg-beirne"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270030","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=270030"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/270030\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/270031"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=270030"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=270030"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=270030"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}