By Spiro Zavos
December 5th 2007 @ 12:26am
The ELVs: The sound of one hand clapping
The decision by SANZAR and the IRB to play some but not all of the Experimental Law Variations (ELVs) in the 2008 Super 14 tournament deserves some applause, the sound of one hand clapping.
The problem is that two of the most interesting and radical ELVs have been discarded.
These two ELVs are: first, defending teams still have to number up in the lineouts: and second, the maul still cannot legally be pulled down.
Under the ELV experiment the defending side did not have to number up in the lineout and either side could put as many players in the lineout as it wanted to, as long as the players were inside the 15m mark.
Rugby is a clever game. It is possible to imagine all sorts of clever options available to both sides with the proposed lineout variation. On attack, for instance, you have 12 men in the lineout with a halfback, five-eighth and winger who could, if he got the ball, have the width of the field to run across to get to the tryline. Of course, the defending side could take players out of the lineout to cover the exposed field. But then this would leave them exposed to a drive from the 12-man lineout …
The right to pull down the maul legally would have forced teams that have used the slow-plod maul to quicken it up. I liken the modern maul to a tank-like and boring drive forward. If teams could undermine the slow maul by pulling it down teams could still maul but they would have to be exciting and unpredicatable cavalry charges.
At the media conference to explain the changes, Matt Carroll, the deputy CEO of the ARU, pointed out that rugby in Australia faced competition from AFL, football and rugby league, in NZ from rugby league and football and in South Africa intense competition from football. The SANZAR rugby product, therefore, had to provide an exciting spectacle for viewers.
I challenged him that on this premise SANZAR should have allowed the maul to be dragged down, as watching a group of forwards slowly move forward with the ball hidden somewhere among them was hardly a rivetting spectacle. Carroll said that the IRB was still investigating the maul but safety reasons were involved in maintaining the present no-pulling down law.
My response to this is that ’safety’ is often given as the main reason why the maul should not be allowed to be pulled down. But I have never seen a player injured when mauls have been pulled down illegally. Why should legal pulling down, with the players expecting a collapse, result in injuries when unexpected collapses don’t?
Pat Howard, the impressive high performance expert for the ARU, said that research indicated that there would be four to five minutes extra play with the new variations. As most Super 14 matches have about 37 minutes or so of actual playing time (a higher figure than the rugby league statistic if uncontested play-the-balls are regarded as dead time), there will be over 10 per cent more play.
The extra play, Howard said, came from fewer shots at goal from penalties. There will now be only three full penalty offences: foul play, offside and not ‘coming through the gate’ for rucks and mauls. As offside play is the bane of open rugby, along with killing the ball at the ruck and mauls, these reforms are welcome.
With the short arm penalties, teams will have the option of playing on, or having a scrum. Good scrumming sides therefore might get more scrums with their own feed than usual, and poor scrumming sides (the Wallabies) can avoid having to defend many scrums with their own feed.
Pat Howard also insisted that fit and skilful sides would score plenty of tries in the last quarter of the Super 14 games when their opponents ran out of puff. The side scoring most tries, too, would generally win their matches even against strong goal-kicking sides.
His point that the reduction of the full penalty to only three offences would liberate open rugby is well made. This opening up of the game will be further enhanced by the new variation that the offside rule comes into effect as soon as a tackle is made.
He explained what might happen with this variation in this way. Say a player made a long break and was tackled by the fullback. All the defenders streaming back are offside until they get behind the last feet of the fullback who made the tackle. At present, the players streaming back are in general play and can get into the play without coming all the way back to the tackle.
Explained like this, the simple change does open up big advantages for the attacking side. As Howard said, the attacking side will be in a position to get full advantage of the break.
Rugby authorities aren’t noted for their boldness in making changes, as the recent IRB conference on the One Rugby Season has revealed. But although I am disappointed about the lineout and maul reforms, what changes have been made have the potential at least to re-invigorate the way rugby is played around the world.
Roll on the 2008 Super 14 tournament!
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(34)
Scuub said | December 5th 2007 @ 1:08am | Report comment
Fair enough on your desire for the maul rules to be implemented Spiro, but I guess the smart call has been made to leave out those ELV’s where a clear improvement could not be predicted.
To be honest, during the ARC I didn’t see the maul raul making much of a difference to the game at all. If you didn’t know there had been a change then you would hardly have noticed. But despite not being a part of the Super14 adaptations of the ELV’s it could still be accepted at a latter date. One step at a time. At least SANZAR has taken that first stride.
These new laws, coupled with the return of the AB’s, the buzz around South African rugby and the evolution in the Aussie Super ranks will lead to a lot of genuine anticipation for the 08 version.
At least in this instance the sound of one hand clapping is better than the sound of officials patting each other on the back (as appeared to be the case after the massively dissapointing Woking conference) for no apparent reason.
SANZAR has shown that rugby administration can actually be aggressively progressive!!
Nick said | December 5th 2007 @ 2:36am | Report comment
I also heard on the news that the incomeing tours, not necessarily the tri-nations, will be held under the old rule. Will this make it difficult for the SANZAR teams to adjust, as they have been playing under the new rules all Super 14?
Temba said | December 5th 2007 @ 10:32am | Report comment
I am with Scuub, it is starting to sound a little like save the whale, save Australian Rugby. One step at a time we don’t want to end up with league and rugby competing because the are exactly the same. If that happens rugby will lose. I like union, I like a good mall, I don’t want to see it change to much. Running the entire game will look like league, one dimensional and boring… to much of a good thing.
Sam Taulelei said | December 5th 2007 @ 11:00am | Report comment
I have never played in the forwards and I’ve always wondered one thing about the maul – why does it have to move so slowly. In an given game whenever the team in possession generates forward momentum I invariably scream at the TV for players to lift their knees and become more dynamic in their leg drive. Instead it’s more of a shuffling action.
The maul can be a more dynamic and dangerous attacking platform than what it is and delivering the ball when their forward momentum is stopped negates any advantage they gained by forcing the opposition backwards as the defence has had time to regroup and realign.
I agree with Spiro’s point that it would be great for rugby if the maul became more unpredictable because it’s an intrinsic part of the game and I don’t want to see it removed but improved.
In the first couple of years in the Super 12 the Auckland Blues led by Zinzan Brooke perfected the driving maul close to the tryline and they effected it so skillfully and at such speed that the opposition had no time to defend against it and if they did, the Blues forwards were so much more dynamic and able to still punch through the opposition. So it can be done and has been done.
Andrew B said | December 5th 2007 @ 11:27am | Report comment
Scrub,
In my opinion, you didn’t notice the maul ELV much in the ARC because teams didn’t even try to set up a rolling maul. I’m not a forward, but I still do actually find maul’s entertaining to watch and a distinct aspect of rugby I’d like to keep.
The numbers in the lineout ELV did away with the short lineout. No-one put 3 men in when the other team can put in 7. It doesn’t matter that the defence is spread a bit thin if you don’t win the lineout.
Overall, I’m pretty excited with what they have acepted. I was interested to see McCaw and Smith using hands in the ruck, but for now this will do.
onside said | December 5th 2007 @ 1:23pm | Report comment
In amongst Spiros article,
‘as most Super 14 matches have about 37 minutes or so of actual playing time…………………’
That statistic is one of the biggest problems facing rugby when trying to recruit new followers.
By and large the ball is in play for about 50% of the match. But people pay for 100% of a match.
This might not matter so much to those weaned on rugby who also enjoy the camarderie at the
local club. Compare the 50% with AFL or football where time on is allocated. I am not comparing
codes, they are all very different. I suppose the worst example is gridiron where the actual playing
time of one hour is spread over three or four hours.But 37 minutes of rugby needs cranking up a bit.
And as Spiro points out, if all the new rules were introduced he anticipated an extra 10% playing time.
The good news under those circumstances might see actual game time increase to say 45 or who
knows maybe even 50 minutes of competitive rugby, but the bad news is, that still leaves about
half an hour or so of matchtime where pretty much nothing happens.
Chris Beck said | December 5th 2007 @ 1:26pm | Report comment
The thought that slow, boring mauls could be defended by pulling it down had never occurred to me before. So on one hand, that sounds OK.
On the other hand, why wouldn’t defending teams immediately default to pulling down the maul every time? Why waste time contesting the maul as it is done today if you can just pull it down? I bet the result would be slow ball, even slower than that for a piled-up ruck.
Maybe the maul should be modified to add some sort of time limit. Let’s say for the sake of argument there’s a time limit of 45 seconds, after which the ball has to come off the back of the maul.
Hypothetically, at 35 seconds, the defending team could in theory start peeling guys away into the backline to defend against the pass that they “know” is coming in the next 10 seconds. The way to counteract that, of course, would be for the team with the ball to switch to some sort of planned move off the back of the maul similar to a movement off of a scrum.
Andrew B said | December 5th 2007 @ 1:31pm | Report comment
Onside,
I’d love to compare the RU, RL and AFL “ball in play” stats – do you know them?
onside said | December 5th 2007 @ 2:07pm | Report comment
Andrew,
No I dont know them . It would be interesting to see comparisons. My
problem is I never played rugby and was introduced to the game late.
When I raise the time issue with current or explayers they point out the
forwards need a break and couldnt possibly play a full on 80 minutes.
I cant argue with this ,but have often wondered if the game would loose
anything divided into four quarters of an ACTUAL 20 minutes per quarter
Surely professional players are fit enough, especially considering reserves.
The public would like it ,and the TV sponsors get more bang for their buck.
All I am aware of is the ref or umpire blows ‘time on ‘ for any reasonable
stopage.Subsequently in football after 45 minutes a board is held up that
indicates the amount of added time and in AFL the standard 25 minute
quarter usually ends up being about 29 or 30 minutes to compensate for the
ball not being in play.
onside said | December 5th 2007 @ 2:10pm | Report comment
Re above ,I somehow mixed up the pars,.but I think the points are still clear
Gruffalo said | December 5th 2007 @ 2:46pm | Report comment
Another time-waster which can be easily addressed. Scrum collapses – it is time that prima donna referees are forbidden from standing between the scrums AND from addressing both teams. It is higly unlikely that, in the middle of a test match, both packs would respond to a generous 30-60 second re-education on the art of scrimmaging. Referees should neither be seen nor heard by the crowd and keep interference to an absolute minimum
If there are too many collapses, start sending off a forward on each side until the scrum has to be non-compete and the game can flow. Despite appearances to the contrary, rugby forwards aren’t all thick – they (and their coaches) will soon learn.
Bob McGregor said | December 5th 2007 @ 3:14pm | Report comment
Interesting to read some of the responses. Also to read there will be only 3 reasons for the awarding of a penalty. Perhaps this area needs to be enlarged so an overall summary of these 3 penalty offences can be assessed correctly. For example if a rolling maul is pulled down would that constitute a penalty offence for foul play or a short arm offence? Likewise, if a rolling maul was not engaged by the defending side would the truck and trailer offence still apply? Going further if a defending side decided not to engage a rolling maul and a defender was then pulled in by the attacking side would that be construed as taking out a defender and if so what would the “penalty” be? We need this spelt out chapter and verse so we can really assess the real outcomes. Until then I’m not real sure what will unfold on the paddock.
Also, regarding the rolling maul, I was always under the impression that when it stopped it couldn’t restart and a scrum had to be reset. Rarely enforced though. Does sideways movement means it is stopped? Plenty of grey areas here? I would like this restricted to forward movement.
Good to see the playing time in Rugby is starting to be discussed. I’ve been pushing this area for months. Only when we have 80 minutes of “playing time” will I be happy. AFL and NFL[Gridiron] have it right. Should apply to Super 14 upwards.
Chas said | December 5th 2007 @ 3:44pm | Report comment
Spiro:
The official IRB statistic referring to the period of time the ball is in play in a typical Rugby Union game is 28 minutes. Add 10% to this and the time is still very minimal.
Etienne said | December 5th 2007 @ 4:23pm | Report comment
Bob – very good point about penalties for pulling down mauls. It seems like the penalty for pulling down mauls will be a short arm, meaning that defending teams will ALWAYS pull down mauls – it being easier defending a quick tap / scrum than defending a rolling maul.
The other issue is hands in the ruck. If a defending player comes in through the gate but then kills the ball on the ground, does that mean the attacking team will only get a short arm penalty? In that case, again, the defending team will ALWAYS kill the ball on the ground – better to defend against a short arm penalty / scrum with your defenders lined up than against quick phase ball from the ruck with your defenders still falling back. I think this will cause a lot of attacking ball being killed on the ground – unless this is penalised as a professional foul, falling under foul play and allowing the attacking team a shot at goal.
All in all, the rules should make for more exciting rugby IMO.
Andrew said | December 5th 2007 @ 5:05pm | Report comment
Spiro,
One problem with your article re lineout numbers. The attacking side have ALWAYS been able to dictate the numbers in the lineout. The only requirement is that the defending team does not have more. The ELV’s did not change this. If a side wants to play 13 in the lineout, the opposition can line up with as many as they want. The only restriction for the attacking side is that they must fit between the 5m and the 15m and of course, they had better win the ball!
Phil said | December 5th 2007 @ 5:39pm | Report comment
“d love to compare the RU, RL and AFL “ball in play” stats – do you know them?”
You would have to assume rugby is last by a country mile.
swifty said | December 5th 2007 @ 9:13pm | Report comment
Phil,
the problem with RL ball in play stats is that they keep the clock running between tackles when in reality the game is stopped. The only person doing anything in this time is the bloke pig-rooting under the tackle – hardly exciting viewing.
You simply can’t compare the sports on ball in play time.
In response to the article I reckon these rule changes are absolute rubbish. Anyone who watched the Wales v Fiji RWC game or the Barbarians v South Africa game will have seen beautiful majestic rugby played under the existing rules. Some of the club games played this year in the northern hemisphere have been sensational with heaps of tries and some real flair. The game’s administrators are chasing a white elephant here. As the rules stand the game is fantastic. These little rule changes are just like introducing cane toads into queensland – some bright spark mucking up the whole thing for everybody with no real idea how things will pan out.
brad said | December 5th 2007 @ 9:38pm | Report comment
well said swifty. Its not like the current game is declining at a rapid rate. the problem in the South is that its not the game but the competitions, same old same old is going to get boring even if the scores are high.
Robb Roi said | December 5th 2007 @ 9:52pm | Report comment
Spiro -
I think you’re pretty spot on, especially about the interesting options the unlimited lineout would offer, though I do wonder about the maul. On the one hand the maul is just a form of organised obstruction – you cant even tackle the bloke doing the blocking properly, forget about touching the guy with the ball – and seems mainly used by teams like SA and England to win penalty kicks at goal. On the other hand, it is a good way of getting forwards out of the backline, as per Alan Jones’ job application for the Wallaby coaching job.
I also wonder about allowing scrums for free kicks. Does that mean that if there’s a scum offence, the penalty is a free kick, but the team can re-set a scrum and so on until Doomsday or fulltime, whichever comes first. Wallabies could really have done with this law in the RWC. But surely allowing scrums defeats the whole purpose of saving time? Wouldnt a better option be to allow kicks for touch retaining the throw-in as for penalties, just dont not goal kicks? The lineout is so much quicker than a scrum but still requires teamwork and tactics, and is distinctively union rather than league. Also gives a pretty much guaranteed penalty of field position unlike the current free kick, which is almost less advantage than a scrum for some teams. If part of the deal is reducing kickfests for goal and the number of cheaply earned points from a long way from goal, determined by refs’ decisions I applaud it. But I’ve always thought another option in the mix could be to ban kicks for goal from over a certain distance, e.g. 30 or 35 metres. If the free kick doesnt provide a sufficient disincentive to infringements the rules then wont they’re be too much incentive for negative spoiling tactics? I guess time willl tell – and the yellow card still comes into play for deliberate or continual fouls I guess. Surely hands in ruck should still be a penalty offence – its hardly one where the ref’s judgement comes into play.
On comparisons with other codes, I wouldnt get too hung up about comparing time in play with soccer. A completely different ball game, excuse the pun. A lot of the time the ball in play there is no intention to attack, no great threat if a tackle is missed or a ball is kicked forward, nor any real prospect that a goal or even a shot at goal is going to happen. And great passages where no side seems to be able to string together a set of clean passes. i.e generally boring, but each to his own.
Ian Noble said | December 5th 2007 @ 9:57pm | Report comment
It is a pity that the ELV’s are not being trialled at a decent level in the NH, as it would be a greater challenge than in the SH. There still is probably an overwelming view in the NH that the proposed changes are contrived to meet Australia’s call for so called “super charged rugby” and a trial in the NH would give greater balance to the debate.
From the previous blog on the ELV’s,my impression rather sadly is that some of the comments suggest that the Aussie paying public is too unsosphicated to appreciate the Union game. I know that sounds rather pompous, but if these ELV’s don’t work, then my fear is there will be a call for further changes to make the game more “super charged and simplier” in effect destroying the fundamental structure of the Union game.
League and NFL are deriveratives of the Union, yet in spite of their efforts to spruce up the game, primarily to suit TV, they are still very much minority sports in a world wide sense than Union. Perhaps that is the truer test of success, as Union continues to grow throughout the World, being played in excess of 100 countries. Whereas, both League and NFL in spite of large sums spent on promotion, still have a very limited appeal world wide.
By the way
1) I was under the impression that one of the original reasons for not pulling down a maul was the danger of serious injury through forcing a collapse, is that correct?
2) Most top flight games in the NH last for 85/90 minutes as the ref is in control of the time and can stop the watch if there are delays and not just for injury.
BennO said | December 7th 2007 @ 12:26am | Report comment
Regarding the collapsing of mauls and whether or not it is a safety issue. I realise that everyone can always come up with an example to support any argument, but I do think that collapsing a maul is very dangerous. This is based on an experience I had in schoolboy rugby.
I was in the second XV playing in the second row. We had formed a maul off lineout ball which was subsequently collapsed. Since I was tangled up in the maul I couldn’t put my hands out to brace myself as we went down and my head hit the ground at an angle that twisted my neck pretty badly. I ended up with nerve pain shooting down my spine, at seemingly unpredictable moments, for about three months afterwards until I got it sorted out.
So personally, I don’t think that it is a good change to the laws as they stand. I do understand the idea behind the proposal, but I think the safety issue is a genuine one. Mine might have been an issue with body position, and although I played rugby from aged 7, I was still relatively inexperienced compared to the super 14 players, but still it seems to serious an area to mess with.
On the other hand cnics might say that the IRB just told SANZAR to forget it, there’s no way the English will allow their mighty rolling maul to be broken up by colonials!
Mike said | December 7th 2007 @ 12:38am | Report comment
I sometimes played in the back row, but was largely a back, and at that played at inside centre the most. I loved nothing more taking a crash ball, keeping my feet, waiting for the forwards and setting up a maul. My favourite memory from playing days was not one of the tries I scored, or kicking a goal from touch to win the game, it was crashing the ball one time in the rain and mud, breaking a few tackles, getting caught again but keeping my feet and getting the maul going, we went 50 metres and I still had the ball, 5m short of the try line and the opposition pulled it down (so it darn should be an offence!). It is such a great part of the game, and unique to the code. We need to keep it.
I watched at least two ARC games each weekend this year, and can’t honestly remember seeing one maul attempt. Introducing the bringing down of mauls means that teams don’t even attempt them. So I am glad that they haven’t brought that rule in. It wasn’t a rule that improved the game.
And as someone mentioned above, the attacking team can already put 12 or 13 in a lineout if they want, but they don’t because of the risk of not winning it. Besides, once you’ve got 7 players in between the 5m and 15m, all the turf is pretty well covered, so any more just becomes a useless saturation. That is also why we didn’t see too many variations in the lineout tactics within the ARC comp. So in this regard, I also feel the lineout numbers rule didn’t really improve the game, let alone even have an effect.
Good stuff for bringing the others in though. I think the Northern hemisphere will pick them up once they see them being used at a top level, and realise that they do make for some fantastic games of rugby.
Spiro Zavos said | December 7th 2007 @ 10:13am | Report comment
From what I saw of the ARC games I was very disappointed that the coaches really did not exploit the possibilities opened up to them with the ELVs. My guess is that someone like Rod Macqueen, one of the creators of the ELVs, would have done a lot more with them if he’d been coaching. Hopefullly the Super 14 coaches will be more imaginative.
Temba said | December 11th 2007 @ 10:04am | Report comment
By Archie Henderson in thetimes.co.za intresting read.
We must be on guard so extremists don’t win the day
Some time ago, a young and ambitious rugby referee was eager to impress an old hand who had been sent to assess his progress.
The ref had just handled a game in which, to put it mildly, the offside rule had been more honoured in the breach than the observance.
“What did you think?” he inquired of the assessor afterwards, with a confident smirk on his face.
“Well,” the assessor started tentatively. “Not too bad, but I think you need to tighten up on the offside law.”
“Oh, I know all about the offside law,” the young ref retorted. “But today I wanted to let the game flow!”
The International Rugby Board, mercifully, has resisted similar laissez faire in its recent tampering with the laws to let the game “flow”.
In an attempt to make the game more attractive allegedly, teams in the Super 14 early next year — and possibly even the Tri-Nations later — will be allowed more room for attack by setting new offside lines at the tackle and set pieces (5m back rather than the last-feet-in- the-scrum rule), greater freedom with quick throw-ins and further restrictions in kicking for touch from inside the 22.
Penalty offences are to be reduced and free-kicks will be more regular.
These new laws (rugby, like cricket, has “laws” rather than “rules”) were enthusiastically put on trial at that great rugby laboratory in Stellenbosch, where the popular Friday-night koshuis league often uses experimental changes such as a clean catch anywhere on the field allows the catcher a free kick.
The latest experiments are known as “experimental law variations” (or ELVs), and all the Super 14 teams have been using them in training sessions so that they won’t be caught short when the tournament starts.
In the southern hemisphere, the Super 14 coaches have embraced them; further north, the usual curmudgeons have scorned them. We should listen to both sides.
For the present, the changes do not appear too radical, but rugby must be on its guard in case the extremists should win the day.
They almost did with these ELVs: there were attempts to allow hands in at the ruck and pulling down mauls, both of which would have undermined the essence of rugby union.
It is still not clear if the last two suggestions have been shelved for good or will be introduced at some future date.
It is interesting to see just who is pushing for such drastic changes: the Aussies.
For years, the Aussies have had a poor scrum, especially in the front row and they were ruthlessly exposed by Andrew Sheridan and his England gang at the World Cup.
In spite of much talk beforehand about how their front row had grown up, the Wallabies were pummelled by England and are always looking to negate the potency of the scrum.
There is also the potentially huge rugby market in Australia’s neck of the woods: Japan, and possibly even China.
If the laws can be changed to benefit these nations, there will be fortunes to be made.
At whose detriment? South Africa’s certainly. Forward power has always been our strength and the Aussies have always been keen to counter this, if not on the field, then in the boardrooms.
Andrew B said | December 11th 2007 @ 10:24am | Report comment
I’ve got to ask any of the Roar posters out there with, um, more life experience than I do (thats the polite way of saying “old” isn’t it?) – Has any of the previous Law changes caused so much ruckus and conjecture? Or would you say this is the result of one of the biggest proposed change in one hit?
Temba said | December 11th 2007 @ 10:26am | Report comment
Andrew B I sugest you read this article it the best one I have read on the ELV’s so far….
Very scary what might happen to rugby.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/sport/rugby/article3021996.ece
Mike said | December 11th 2007 @ 10:34am | Report comment
Though Andrew I would suggest before you read any of Jones’s biased drivel, you take two big handfuls of salt, and perhaps a mouthful as well to help mask the bitter taste.
Temba, I would also argue, it’s very scary what might happen to rugby if it doesn’t evolve. Change is a good thing, you just need to be careful how it is implemented, and also not be afraid to admit its failure if it does. If these changes were bad for the game, they would not have left Stellenbosch. The reason they are being implemented (with the exception of the two that didn’t improve the game) is because they have been trialled, and been successful.
Bring it on!
Temba said | December 11th 2007 @ 11:16am | Report comment
I thought I might get a bit of stick for posting that link….
Jones does right like an old lady with wet pants… Moaning article after article but sometimes he does hit the nail.
I just hope that Australia would be able to except it if the ELV got removed because they did not work for everyone but Aus (and maybe NZ). I do understand that in Aus you compete with League and AFL but I don’t think law changes will make a difference to that.
Lets see how it goes in the S14. I am very excited to see these in action with the top teams like the sharks, Crusaders and Tahs. At the very least it will give us plenty to talk about.
Mike said | December 11th 2007 @ 11:30am | Report comment
Sure, I don’t deny it’s mostly Aussies pushing for it, but that’s not just because we have to compete with other codes, it’s also because we got a better look at them in the ARC. Did you see any of it? Or NZ reserve grade? I think they did the right thing by not including the hands in ruck or pulling down of the maul laws, and as a result genuinely feel the new laws will be successful.
They don’t seem to “league-ify” the game at all, though sadly we did see less scrums, which can be seen as an advantage to us pushovers. So I don’t think this takes the game in the right direction. However, perhaps there were less scrums because if you give an Aussie the choice, we would kick or run before packing down. Perhaps other nations will choose otherwise? Also, as I mentioned earlier, there were next to no rolling mauls, not bringing in the pulling down law means this change won’t come into effect.
Temba said | December 11th 2007 @ 11:34am | Report comment
We can only wait and see how the best coaches in the world use the Laws. ARC is good but the true result of these laws will show when the top dogs get their hands on it. This is the most exciting thing about the new Laws is to see what tactics the best minds come up with. Should be a more exciting season then last years at least… Even thought my team won
Ian Noble said | December 11th 2007 @ 6:59pm | Report comment
This was my comment on the views of Stuart Dickenson
“At last a considered view from somebody whose opinion should be respected.
It must be pretty obvious that a strong pack will dominate proceeding and prevent the backs from getting the ball. Infringements that were punished by penalties will become free kicks, with the danger of a greater number of infringements by the pack as they will be not too concerned by a freekick. The only potential recourse by refs will be to dish out yellow cards for persistent offenders, so expect a flurry of yellow cards, particularly by the weaker pack as it tries to stop the advance of the stronger pack.”
Having viewed the NZ Herald web site, and in particular, the comments on the ELV’s there appears to be greater concern about the effectiveness of the new laws. Personally I welcome the test in the S14 and it will be interesting to see how the SA and NZ squads react, as traditionally their scrums are stronger than the Aus squads.
Dublin Dave said | January 8th 2008 @ 7:28pm | Report comment
It’s good that the majority of the new laws were booted into touch, if that’s the correct phrase. Law changes are just a comfort blanket for those who have run out of tactical ideas to operate within the existing laws. Once you start making changes, and then changes deemed to be necessary because of those changes then you quickly find the shape of the game spiralling out of control and turning into something else completely.
Occasionally things turn full circle and that can be a good thing.
With that in mind, how about this for a change in the lineout laws: why does there have to be a 1m space between players of the same team at a lineout? If you look at old recordings of the game as it was before about 1974, you will see that the lineout, far from taking up about 15m of space in from the touch line instead took about 5m. Players were bunched up together and in those days of no (legal) lifting the lineout became a bit of a free for all. But it meant that there was a huge amount of space out wide for the backs to play in.
My recollection, and I will stand corrected if somebody can contradict me, is that the law about spaces between players was brought in precisely to make it easier to spot illegal lifting and barging. But nowadays, we allow lifting, so the reason for that law is now moot. By all means, have a 1m gap between the opposing teams until the ball is thrown in to stop pushing and barging, but there is now no need to have a gap between players of the same team.
Why not contract the amount of space in which a lineout can take place from 15m in from touch to 10m?
Andrew B said | January 9th 2008 @ 9:51am | Report comment
Dublin Dave,
There is no Law requiring players in the same team in a lineout to be 1m apart.
gavin said | August 31st 2008 @ 8:54pm | Report comment
I’ll be happy if they went back to the old rules