There's little dispute where Caelan Doris' best position is but that doesn't mean the Ireland back row automatically gets the number 8 shirt.
After tour de force outings during Ireland's summer series win over New Zealand last year, the Mayo man enhanced his reputation during the 2023 Six Nations, with a series of dynamic displays off the back of the scrum.
The 25-year-old also demonstrated his versatility when switched to the blindside flank for the win over Italy in Rome, making room for Jack Conan to take up his preferred position at 8.
His latest appearance, starting on the openside against Italy ten days ago, saw Doris pick up yet another man of the match award as he ran in two tries in the 33-17 win. He switched back to 8 when Conan picked up a foot injury before half-time.
And he has earned a ringing endorsement from the current World Rugby player of the year Josh van der Flier, himself a certain starter at 7 in Andy Farrell's first XV for all major matches.
"Yeah, there always seems to be a lot of competition around the back row and Caelan did brilliantly the last day," said Van der Flier, a Leinster team-mate of Doris.
"He had a very, very good game and I think any time he takes the field at the moment he's performing really, really well.
"There's always a lot of competition and I'm well used to it."
Conan looks likely to sit out Saturday's evening's game against England (5.30pm) as he recovers with Van der Flier (above), Peter O'Mahony, Ryan Baird, Gavin Coombes, Cian Prendergast and Tadhg Beirne providing other back row options for Farrell.
"We kind of bounce off each other, the whole back-row group in the squad moment, we tend to be learning different things off each other," added Van der Flier, set to win his 51st cap if named in the matchday squad tomorrow afternoon.
"It's something that [assistant coach] Paul O'Connell encourages quite a lot, if there's someone who is really good at something Paul would be like, 'why don't you work with them on that'.
"That's encouraged a huge amount within the group and I think in the same way he has learned things from me, I have certainly learned things from him as well."
Three weeks out from the Rugby World Cup, forwards coach Paul O'Connell and high performance analyst Vinny Hammond show @treacyj how Ireland are using technology to incorporate live analysis into their training #RWC2023 pic.twitter.com/4gXjOVa09k
— RTÉ Rugby (@RTErugby) August 16, 2023
While Ireland had last weekend off, spent at a training camp in Portugal, opponents England warmed up with a second match in two weeks against Wales, this time claiming a 19-17 victory.
Van der Flier says he was able to get some homework done.
"I suppose one of the areas I look at is I tend to be in between the backs and forwards in terms of lineout defence and scrum defence and they certainly had a few nice plays and moves in that area," said the 30-year-old.
"They seem to have good variety around their lineouts, which is obviously a big threat, and they have some good ball players and good ball carriers as well.
"So it will definitely be a physical challenge, which we're used to, but then they have a few trick plays thrown in there as well."
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