How Lions can fix scrum, line-out and restart woes

Telegraph

17 hours ago

While we may associate tour fixtures with dazzling tries, Test matches involving the British and Irish Lions are often tense and tight affairs governed by the set-piece battle.
For that reason, Joe Schmidt might be feeling optimistic. Because, despite some dashing attack and two 50-point hauls on Australian soil, the 2025 Lions have been less than convincing at the scrum, at the line-out and at restarts over their three games so far.
Failure to tidy up these critical areas before the series opener against the Wallabies on July 19 will leave Andy Farrell's side in strife. Fixes will be a priority.
Scrums
After bullying Argentina at the Aviva Stadium with a destructive display led by Ellis Genge and Finlay Bealham, the Lions' scrum has blown hot and cold.
As far as selection, Farrell has kept his props in designated pairs up until Saturday's meeting with the Waratahs: Genge and Bealham, Pierre Schoeman and Tadhg Furlong, and Andrew Porter and Will Stuart. Each of these duos has experienced issues.
A lack of familiarity is bound to be a factor. Cohesion, that ubiquitous buzzword, is as critical in scrums as it is anywhere on the pitch. Most players that took on the Pumas had a decent spell in training together ahead of that game. Once the Lions arrived in Australia as a larger group, with matches coming thick and fast, there may have been fewer opportunities for reps as a tight-five combination.
Against Western Force, a front row of Schoeman, Dan Sheehan and Furlong were backed up by a lock pairing of Scott Cummings and Joe McCarthy. That gave the Lions some established connections, but the Force were probably in the ascendancy until the second period.
Tom Robertson, Brandon Paenga-Amosa and Ollie Hoskins caused Schoeman, Sheehan and Furlong to pop up under pressure here, and could have earned a penalty from referee Ben O'Keeffe:
In Brisbane, the Lions conceded four scrum penalties and two more free-kicks to Queensland Reds over the 80 minutes. In most cases, they were undone by a lack of balance. At the site of the first scrum, note that Ollie Chessum is the tighthead lock. Maro Itoje, in that role for the Argentina match, has switched across to the loosehead:
Here, referee James Doleman tells Stuart that he has 'changed his angle and moved across'. This camera angle does seem to show a collective crab from the Lions, with Stuart angling in:
Later in the first quarter, assistant referee Paul Williams alerts Doleman to what he believes to be an offence from Porter:
Williams suggests Porter is responsible for this collapse:
Aidan Ross and Jeffery Toomaga-Allen, the starting props for the Reds, are experienced operators. Porter and Stuart had been handed their first starts of the tour. Perhaps their eagerness to impress manifested itself in an overly aggressive approach.
Later on, we can appreciate how the interconnecting cogs of the tight five must gel. James Ryan has replaced Chessum and stays on the tighthead side behind a new front row of Genge, Luke Cowan-Dickie and Bealham:
Watch Ryan, who had never previously played with the three English members of the tight five, from here:
He appears to jump the gun slightly, shunting forward just before the ball is put in. Doleman clocks this movement and blows for a free-kick:
Genge was adjudged to have lost his bind at this scrum with Sef Fa'agase coming forward, which surrendered another penalty:
Then, towards the end, the Lions totter to their right between the 'bind' and 'set' phases of the set-up. Doleman upgrades a free-kick to a penalty:
As they had done in Perth, the Lions finished strongly. They scored three second-half tries from scrums, eking out a penalty advantage here to lay a platform for Fin Smith to release Garry Ringrose:
Garry Ringrose caps off a fine day for the Lions 🦁 pic.twitter.com/PRdCfakDdj
— Sky Sports Rugby Union (@SkySportsRugby) July 2, 2025
Consistency is the key from here, not least because the referees for the Test matches – O'Keeffe, Andrea Piardi and Nika Amashukeli – are all overseeing the Lions in tour matches before those dates.
Solution: John Fogarty, the Lions scrum coach, will not panic. Clarity over selection for the first Test will bring more scope for the front-line pack to scrummage together in training and focus on a sturdy set-up. That should lead to greater composure and accuracy in matches.
A question mark does, however, hang over the tighthead prop berth. Furlong is the senior figure, but has not yet shown vintage form. Farrell is mixing up his front-row combinations for the Waratahs, with Schoeman, Cowan-Dickie and Bealham starting and Genge, Sheehan and Furlong among the replacements. Keep an eye on how the respective units fare.
Line-outs
Given the line-out could not have been much worse in the loss to Argentina, when the Lions were crippled by overthrows and other gaffes at vital times, improvements have been palpable.
Reds did manage a couple of steals on Wednesday in different ways. Here, early in the first half at a five-man set-up, they beat their opponents' movement over the ground to enable Josh Canham to climb in front of Chessum:
Lukhan Salakaia-Loto, since called up into the Australia training squad as cover for Will Skelton, is the key. He spins on the second dummy jump, from Tom Curry, to lift Canham:
Later in the first half, Salakaia-Loto forces a spill at another five-man set-piece:
The throw is only ever a single part of the complex line-out jigsaw, but this one from Ronan Kelleher is underdone. You can tell because Chessum is reaching forwards:
Players and coaches speak about 'max drill', when jumpers take a throw at the very top of a lift. That is the case later for another five-man routine, when Luke Cowan-Dickie finds Itoje following a subtle dummy from James Ryan, an excellent line-out forward. Genge almost throws Itoje to take this:
As it happens, Ryan Smith (Reds number 19) does well to splinter the subsequent maul after it has eked out metres:
Polished line-out operations require immense diligence and energy, because there is so much that can go wrong. For instance, Bundee Aki should have dotted down at the tail of a drive in the first half against the Reds. His side had done all the hard work, only to be thwarted by a pile-up of bodies.
Even so, the Lions are undoubtedly progressing. An intricate move in the second period comprised several moving parts. Note that Jac Morgan begins in the receiver slot:
He joins the five-man line-out as an 'insert lifter' as Genge and Ryan shape to lift Curry at the front. Meanwhile, Morgan arrives further back to lift Itoje.
Curry and Ryan peel around towards the ball and the former lifts a pass to Cowan-Dickie, who in turn feeds Tommy Freeman behind the run of Aki:
The Lions line-out is developing before our eyes.
Solution: Balancing the back five of the pack is crucial for Andy Farrell and the decision on blindside flanker is a big one. Curry's line-out work, as a jumper but also shuttling over the ground and lifting as part of five-man routines, is perhaps underappreciated. Opting to start Joe McCarthy could require Tadhg Beirne to wear six and Jack Conan's jumping may be called upon more than it was against the Reds.
Things will probably get worse before they get better, because the starting back row for the Waratahs game – Henry Pollock, Josh van der Flier and Ben Earl – does not feature a regular jumper. However, the Lions are sure to be keeping back a few surprise set plays. One imagines that most of the front-line pack will be given a run against the Brumbies to iron out creases and find rhythm.
Restarts
From impeccable to ridiculous, the Lions' restarts – from halfway and the goal-line – have been a roller coaster. They gathered all seven against Argentina before coughing up possession from five against the Force, which did not even tell the whole story of their calamites.
Rewinding to Dublin, this was the Lions' formation at the kick-off:
This map details the Lions players by their shirt numbers. It seems they are expecting a kick to their left flank, because they are slightly understaffed on the right. It is interesting that Freeman (14) is positioned for a short chip down the middle. His aerial skills are hugely influential in these situations:
When the kick does go towards the far side, Aki (12) is pressed into action as an emergency lifter. He does superbly, helping Bealham to support Beirne's jump:
There are two tweaks for the next 50-metre restart. Cowan-Dickie (2) switches sides and Sione Tuipulotu (13) swaps places with Earl (8):
This is what it looks like:
From this second kick, the Lions lifting pod of Cowan-Dickie, Beirne and Bealham slightly misjudge the flight of the ball but Earl comes forward to claim:
From there, the Pumas went deeper to Earl each time. Western Force proved trickier.
The Lions changed their formation for Perth, perhaps to take pressure off Pollock. Mack Hansen (14) was moved across to the receiving side:
Nic White's first kick is excellent. It lobs the lifting pod of Sheehan, Scott Cummings and Furlong (2, 4, 3) and allows Dylan Pietsch to steal in front of Hansen, who cannot back up his team-mates as Earl had done against Argentina:
An even flatter strike from White later on brought Pietsch into the game again, and Cummings conceded a penalty for taking out the airborne Force wing:
Cummings has copped criticism for these errors, but they continued when Chessum arrived from the bench. Pietsch helps win back possession here as well:
Against the Reds, there were more tweaks in formation. They reverted to the shape they had used against Argentina, with Aki (12) dropping into the back-field and Freeman (14) hugging a touchline rather than holding the middle:
This is what it looked like at the kick-off:
Jamison Gibson-Park (9) and Finn Russell (10) switched ahead of this mix-up, which can be attributed to a communication lapse:
Otherwise, Conan was solid. He punched holes in the Reds chase and this cute pass to Duhan van der Merwe sparks an eye-catching break-out:
There was one more hiccup at a shorter restart, though. Cowan-Dickie and Genge hoist Itoje here…
…but the Reds flood through to win a maul turnover. As with the scrums and line-outs, restarts are multi-faceted.
Solution: New laws on escorting mean that short restarts have become more of a lottery and Australia are bound to harness Joseph Aukuso-Sua'ali'i as they did at Twickenham last November.
The Lions need to be quick over the ground when opponents go short, while working in groups to cover the 'seams' of their formation – for instance, the space in behind a lifting pod – and staying alert to inevitable ricochets.
Freeman, who snaffled one of the Lions' own restarts in Brisbane, could be a trump card. What about a man-marking job on Aukuso-Sua'ali'i? The Lions must devote time and thought to what will be a pivotal aspect of the Test series.