Getting back to basics puts Sexton in his comfort zone

INTERVIEW WITH JONATHAN SEXTON:ONE CRITICAL aspect of the game that outhalf Jonathan Sexton has been dealing with since he stepped up to the front line in Leinster's Magners League and Heineken Cup campaign this season is how Michael Cheika wants him to play.

The 23-year-old has largely operated in the shadow of Felipe Contepomi and Isa Nacewa but, with both injured for this weekend's meeting with Dragons, his opportunity to impress and nail down a place for the following week's Heineken Cup game against Castres hinges on how he can perform his original outhalf track.

Sexton has benefited from Gordon D'Arcy's injury, which occasionally has allowed Contepomi shift into the centre and each Magners League match is seen as another chance to impress. He also knows Nacewa will not be available next week and Contepomi may not be available. Performing on Saturday against Dragons would press his case.

"Obviously there's a few knocks and a few bumps, which is going to open the door for other players," he says. "It's up to them to keep the standard high and take their chance."

The reworked version of Sexton's game, a blending of what he was seeing around him, wasn't being received that kindly. Combined with a perceived need to impress the new coaches that had arrived into Donnybrook at the beginning of the season, it may have caused the young player to force himself into a style of game that took him out of his comfort zone.

Sexton has gone back to basics. The older version with a little polish and more thought has now taken him on a career path at number 10 that is less cluttered. He will not try to play like a Contepomi, nor does the coach want him to. "Maybe I was trying too hard in the games at the start of the year, not doing what I was supposed to be doing and trying to do things to make an impression on the new coaches in Leinster, maybe trying too hard," he says.

"Then when I got left out I kind of reassessed things and that's the conclusion I came to. I'm trying to get back to doing what I should be doing. That's trying to control things and not doing anything too outlandish, just get on with my job. When you're competing against players like Felipe and Isa Nacewa - and they're two different types of players - they are both off the cuff, flamboyant, whatever word you want to put on it. Maybe I'm not that type of player but I was trying to be that because I felt I had to be to compete with these guys.

"Then I spoke to Michael Cheika and he just wanted me to do what I do and give him a different option, more like controlling the game and not trying to do things on my own. I'll take that on board."

Sexton speaks with a coherent, self-analytical maturity. Maybe the weight of the demands of the position forces players to assume greater clarity of what they are about more than other positions do. But nor should it be forgotten that he was selected onto the Six Nations Championship squad earlier this year. That opportunity passed him when he fractured his thumb playing with Leinster shortly before the competition began. This season he has started a handful of Magners League games but was benched for the two Heineken Cup matches, coming on cold against Wasps and doing well.

"Yeh I was delighted with that," he says. "That's what I hope to continue to do for the remainder of the season. Obviously the week after against Glasgow wasn't great. Conditions were tough. But I know I can get back to standard against Wasps."

Giving Cheika a viable option is the St Mary's College player's first priority. Then giving Cheika no option but to consistently pick him is the aspiration. What Sexton represents is a different option to that of his Argentine and New Zealand colleagues.

"He (Cheika) wants different types of players in the same position that can play different types of games," he says.

"That might mean one week he'll pick me and the next he'll pick someone else. I've got to get back to what put me in that position, hopefully putting the team in the right position, controlling the forwards and making the right decisions."

Simply said. Not so simply done.