RUGBY: JOHNNY WATTERSONtalks to the 20-year-old Leinster backrower who has not dawdled in making impressions when given a chance this season and has shown that the 'no excuse because we're young' belief continues to foment his ambition

AT 20 YEARS OLD, the wary look of a schoolboy is still in his face. His posture is one of respect. A prefect at attention in the headmaster’s office. Dutiful. Obedient. A little outside his comfort zone. Willing.

Dominic Ryan stands with his hands behind his back on the iced path that runs along from the back of Leinster’s training centre at Riverview towards the Belfield sprawl, a beanie pulled over his head. He projects a beguiling image of calm and for a split second you buy that absurd notion before discarding it. Why? Because you’ve seen him play.

Three months ago Ryan was pushed into the Leinster side when Ireland squad defections and injury to Kevin McLaughlin created space. One former Gonzaga boy left, another came in. Straightaway he adopted an uncompromising attitude that has come to define the way he has charted his career.

“The fact we’re young people shouldn’t be an excuse,” he said, levelling the field.

Ryan has not dawdled in making impressions when given a chance. When Jamie Heaslip’s ankle ballooned last week at Stade Marcel Michelin, Ryan was again able to shop window his ability against a ferocious Clermont backrow of Julien Bonnaire, Alexandre Lapandry and former All Black Sione Lauaki. He hit rucks and players, upping the ante to an aggression level that was almost spiteful.

What close observers of the Irish Under-20 team would have known is Ryan wasn’t showboating to make an impression. He played last week the same way he plays every week and has shown the “no excuse because we’re young” belief continues to foment ambition, drive him on. “I just went in with the mindset to smash them and I suppose we did alright,” he says of Clermont’s international trio.

“At the start I knew it was going to be a tight game so I wasn’t sure if I was going to get on. But I was ready mentally to get on the pitch. And when I saw Jamie go down after five minutes, in fairness to him, he kind of muscled it out until half-time, I went on and I just tried to fit in, get the game set rather than do something stupid like give away a penalty or anything like that. So I knew it was going to be a physical game and I knew it was going to be tough.”

Those who have watched Ryan close up talk of a smart player, who undermines the perception he uses his body as some sort of blunt force instrument. Willy Clancy has coached him at Lansdowne and Allan Clarke in the Irish Under-20 set up. While both speak of a player who will not shy away from the physical challenges they will argue it’s a misplaced judgment to see his rampaging game as purely brawn.

“The perception is he would make kamikaze tackles. But he is intelligent as well. He’s not just a battering ram,” explains Clancy.

“Dominic has good hands and he’s good when we have the ball and he’s good when they have the ball. He’s an all-round modern flanker. He’s a fantastic athlete with an excellent attitude. He makes the point that age is not important if you are good enough.

“He could be as effective as a six. If you look at the top GAA players a lot of it comes down to being a fantastic athlete. He’s a bright guy and sees an opportunity presenting itself and he wants to walk through the door. He’s not the huge wrecking ball but intelligence and smarts are there too.”

Eerily, Clarke speaks a similar language to that of the Lansdowne man. A precocious talent at school, Ryan played for Ireland Under-20 at 18 years of age and was a central figure in last season’s Six Nations Championship-winning team and pivotal to the side that travelled to the World Cup in Argentina in the summer. The paths of the player and the coach are inextricably linked. “Getting selected in the Ireland Under-20 team at 18 tells you a lot about him,” says Clarke. “He’s a good listener, easy to coach. I think he’s intelligent and a strength of his is the physical edge he brings to a game, his ability to play in the moment. He’s a tackler and a defender.

“When he’s in the moment and concentrating he’s a fantastic young prospect. What I like about him is he keeps his feet on the ground and he recognises things don’t happen by chance. Dominic is an early achiever. He’s ready for the professional game. Someone like him needs a string of consistent performances to take him to the next level.”

He is callow in the way he talks. There’s fearlessness and an ability to take the view that the French player with the ball who he is lining up for a tackle, even if his name is Bonnaire, is just flesh and blood. If it’s Lauaki, he has two arms and legs like everyone, a trophy hit all the same. Ryan allows himself to see his game simply and has an ability to remove the clutter. Perhaps at his age that is a good thing, good enough at least to play Heineken Cup for 40,000 people.

“It doesn’t make a difference to me, to be honest, if I’m playing AIL for Lansdowne or playing Heineken Cup,” he says. “I still make 100 per cent commitment to the tackle or in the ruck, and whoever it is at the end of the day, if you hit them hard enough they’ll go down.”

Of course we like it. We like the attitude, the bravado. We like the concussive tackles and the distain for reputation, the retention of that youthful sense of invulnerability. We like the confidence and the simplicity. We like the ambition and the can-do determination.

We like the fact what we see as physical risk he sees as a team imperative, what we see as reckless bravery he sees as the perfect execution of technique. We like his potential and his form and we like the fact when he plays today we will watch him. We like that he’s still in the academy, a junior mixing it higher up the food chain. Ryan draws himself to the eye by the way he goes about his business, quite a talent for a 20-year-old flanker. “If you are in contention to play you have to put yourself out there, train as hard as you can, give commitment in everything you do,” he says. “At the start of the season I still kind of felt myself that I was one of the younger players, one of the more inexperienced, and that still is there.

“But I’ve got a good few games under my belt now. At the back of your mind you feel you can improve at this level and you’ve played well and have been able to hack the pace. But if you’re not fully committed, you’re not going to perform and that’s why you go into it with 100 per cent commitment.”

This week was one of exams. You can be sure his mind was elsewhere. For a player who does not do things by halves you could also bet he was thinking of where to put his 6ft 3ins, 16-stone frame. Doubtlessly, in French faces.