James Ryan believes Ireland can't afford to lose their edge in their bid to clean up their discipline.
Penalties and yellow cards were a common feature of Irish matches in 2024, allowing their opponents regularly stay in touch in games with three-pointers off the tee.
In terms of cards, Andy Farrell’s side averaged a yellow card for every game they played last year, which was a dramatic leap from the three yellows they had picked up in their previous 29 matches.
"We definitely want to push the boundaries and for us, it's getting the balance right between the avoidable and the unavoidable penalties," Ryan said, ahead of Saturday’s Guinness Six Nations opener against England.
"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 like 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."
The sweet spot between playing on the edge and being undisciplined is a very fine line, although with Ireland’s defence giving up just 12 tries in 11 games last year, it does give them licence to test the patience of match officials.
And Ryan believes it's imperative that Ireland continue to attack the margins.
"If you’re not playing on the edge at this level, that's just not going to go too well for you.
"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."
The 28-year-old's role has changed for Ireland in recent seasons.
For years the second row had been seen as the natural successor to Johnny Sexton as Ireland and Leinster captain, and while he has skippered both club and country in recent seasons, that job has now been passed on to Caelan Doris.
Rather than going into his shell, Ryan appears to be playing with more freedom without the burden of captaincy. After missing a chunk of last year’s Six Nations with a bicep injury, he looked back to his best during Ireland’s tour of South Africa last summer, before starting three of the four Tests in November.
One area Ryan has been keen to upskill is his work as a ball-carrier.
"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.
"Off-pitch, 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.
"I think I'm playing better this year at this point probably than I was last year. 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 got back from my bicep, but yeah, I feel I'm in a good place.
"I wouldn’t say I’m more relaxed going into games. I still get quite a bit of that pre-game nerves and anxiety and so on.
"But I guess I’m at a level now where I think I have a better idea now than I did when I was a bit younger in terms of what I need to get across in the week of a Test match, what boxes do I need to tick and what's going to give me confidence in terms of my preparation in order to go out and perform on the weekend.
"I think I've a good plan in terms of what I need to do both off the pitch and on the pitch every week to go into a game feeling like I’ve the right to perform, if that makes sense," he added.
