Rules and referees are ruining our game
Roar Pro
By Luke Hymers, 23 Mar 2010 The Crowd is a Roar Pro
- Tagged:
- rugby referees, Rugby Union, Super Rugby
South Africa's Bulls captain Victor Matfield gestures to the fans after winning the semi-final of the Super 14 rugby match against New Zealand Crusaders at the Loftus Versfeld stadium in Pretoria, South Africa, Saturday May 23, 2009. The Bulls defeated the Crusaders 36-23. (AP Photo/Themba Hadebe
Modern rugby is hampered by confused, disjointed and misguided opinion of how to ‘fix the problem’ in the structure of the rules and horrifically inconsistent refereeing as a result of widespread confusion.
The biggest problem with rugby is that the IRB’s many attempts at amending the rules are killing the core principles of the game that it’s trying to supposedly save.
Rugby’s biggest issue in the last 10 years has been the ease with which players get away with killing the ball in their defensive red zone, not how much opportunity teams have to score tries.
Richie McCaw and co get away with murder when opposing teams storm their line and the defensive players are happy with risking giving away 3 points, as it is obviously better than 7.
If we are wanting to see more tries, then the points system for penalties needs to be amended. Players must be aptly punished for negative play. It is a core value of the sport across the board but it is not being upheld effectively, which has led to the stagnant defense and kicking-based games that plague our fields, stadiums and screens today.
Rugby has lost its appeal because it’s ridden with negative, cheating play, and more recently, as a result of the changed rules, scrappy, soft, directionless slop.
The current Super 14 rule changes, or ‘re-interpretations’, have destroyed the physicality and raw challenge at the breakdown, and we’re not necessarily seeing better rugby as a result.
Top teams end up in defensive stalemates because they don’t commit at the breakdown so as to fill their defensive line. And we’re either seeing teams have a decent balance and hold out, or not pay enough attention to one or the other and end up leaking tries from the speedy recycling through the middle, as in the case of the Lions.
Breakdown prowess is no longer a priority and referees also seem to appear to have forgotten the one very positive rule that was introduced last year, where a defensive player arriving at the tackled ball first on his feet (provided he enters from the back, and if he is the tackler, releases and retires first) has full rights to hang onto it until bashed off the ball or his feet.
Should that not happen, the defensive team receives a penalty for holding.
Where has this rule gone?
I don’t know how many times in this year’s Super 14 I’ve lamented the apparent ignorance of referees to this rule as quality turnovers are wrongfully punished. It’s near impossible to turnover ball, apart from simply waiting for an opposition mistake.
It’s not better to give the attacking team the advantage because it does exactly that! It creates an unfair advantage and the current stronger interpretations just make rucking and mauling a thing of the past because defenses acknowledge that they’re disadvantaged and just re-form.
Why don’t we all just go and watch the NRL? It’s boring, pointless and frustrating as the key aspects of specialist forward play have been completely eliminated.
If we want to see an improvement in rugby, go back to how we played it in 2007, bar the few new rules that have had a positive effect (first player at ball has rights and 22 pass back, for example), but punish negative play and the farce that is penalty kicks from any further than 40m out and give teams a limit for how long they can keep the ball at the last feet of their ruck.
Let’s hope they sort out the current mess and get back to good hard rugby that encourages positive play within the rules that are set out and apt punishment which encourages teams to defend properly, not to cheat.
And to attack, not to kick, and to ruck and maul, not to fan out your defensive line.
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ohtani's jacket said | March 23rd 2010 @ 1:58am | Report comment
I’m afraid the problem with rugby is that every Tom, Dick and Harry has a different opinion about how it should be played as evidenced by your article, which I’m sure people will have contentions with.
What people need to remember is that there is good rugby and bad rugby and they tend to be in extremes. There’s no such thing as consistently good rugby because it’s basically a structureless game. There’s no six tackle rule that guarantees a certain flow to the game or anything like that. They’ve tried to improve that aspect of the game this year with the new interpretations and people complain because somehow they think rugby can be a contest and breathtaking at the same time. Well, I’m sorry but one tends to negate the other in rugby. If it’s a contest then it’s dour and if it’s breathtaking then there isn’t much of a contest.
And let’s face it — some sides are poor no matter how the game’s being reffed. Old laws, ELVs, new interpretations, it doesn’t make a whit of difference if Australia has marquee teams as bad as the Waratahs and Brumbies. How can people say that their poor performances have anything to do with the way the laws are enforced?
The Super 14 hasn’t been bad this year, it’s just a non-event because the South Africans are running away with it. The Aussie and Kiwi teams ought to man up and make it interesting.
Lee said | March 23rd 2010 @ 5:35am | Report comment
Well said…if the Tahs and Brumbies were 1 and 2, and the Wallabies had won more than 1 game in the Tri Nations last year, there would be a lot less complaining about the “state of rugby”.
sheek said | March 23rd 2010 @ 6:41am | Report comment
OJ,
That’s damn well said….. !
Brett McKay said | March 23rd 2010 @ 7:50am | Report comment
great points OJ, I concur completely. The Super rugby this year is a vast improvement on recent years, even with the Bulls and Stormers so far ahead of the pack. But even then, watching those two teams, you’re not going to be disappointed with how they play.
More rule changes will just unearth another batch of unhappy punters, and rugby strikes me as the classic example of never being able to keep everyone happy all the time….
Sam said | March 23rd 2010 @ 7:51am | Report comment
I agree well said. I think if an Australian team was playing like the Bulls or Stormers there wouldn’t be so many complaints. I completely agree that poor teams are poor under old laws, ELVs, new laws, new interpretations, and at the end of the day its just used as a convenient excuse for poor rugby.
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 8:42am | Report comment
if you read what i wrote, i said nothing of the australian teams, in fact i don’t care about the australian teams or the wallabies, i support the springboks and the bulls as that is where i’m from, so the state of australian rugby is not my concern, in fact more directly, the fact that the ARU are the main reason for all the stupidest ideas in trying to change the game is a massive problem, the other sides of sanzar need to shut John O’Neill up!
My point is that there was nothing wrong with rugby in 2007, i know rugby is an inconsistent game and that’s the beauty of it. I’ll happily watch a grind or a thriller with equal enjoyment but when teams are deliberately cheating to deny their opposition deserved points and they’re not being duly punished by referees who are to scared to pull out the yellow and give penalty tries because they’ll get slayed in the media, they need a better more widespread option, one that encourages positive play.
so there is a perhaps more simplified, shorter version of my article for you….if you actually managed to read it the first time, which is evidently unlikely
Sam said | March 23rd 2010 @ 8:50am | Report comment
I wasn’t referring to you specifically. This being an Australian site and all was just commenting that we wouldn’t have so many complaints from the mainly Australian Roarers if all the Australian teams were playing like the Reds.
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 9:06am | Report comment
yeah, fair call…but you understand that i’m not on about team performances i’m talking about encouraging positive play across the board via a rule system that gives allows referees to not be intimidated by curcumstance…how many times SHOULD Richie McCaw have recieved yellow cards and penalties in his career? Particularly in tests in NZ?? It’s an absolute joke…..if the rule is there and it’s concrete then noone’s gonna give away a try’s worth of points, it’s too much….by reducing the margin between a try and a penalty in the red zone we might be able to eliminate the rate of professional fouls being blown and pointless 3 point penalties and actually have teams play and defend fairly because they’re at risk of losing that amount of points regardless. as opposed to a potential 4 point buffer if you give away a penalty as opposed to a try….it kills the game.
Sam said | March 23rd 2010 @ 9:01am | Report comment
As you are commenting, can you comment on one thing, you say that forward play is being eliminated (obviously with the exception of scrums and lineouts) specifically rucking and mauling, but what observation makes you say that? The Stormers are mauling awesomely and its one reason they’re 2nd on the table, and the Bulls basically won their match against the Hurricanes by mauling well and forcing several crucial penalties (especially in the second half). Those two teams – who seem to have the best mauls in the competition – are clearly the top 2 teams at the moment? Is that co-incidental?
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 9:10am | Report comment
yeah but have you read about colin cooper contesting the referee’s ruling at the maul from the weekend?? The current interpretations try to de-power the maul by insisting that, particularly from line-outs, the defending team should be allowed to have direct contact with the ball carrier without blockers….so it’s a bit of a contentious issue at the moment, as some games and teams have practically been ruled out of mauling as teams just step off and then make secondary contact and then the attacking team gets blown….it looks ridiculous and is….as for the rucks….have you seen one with more than 4 players competing in this year’s super 14?
Sam said | March 23rd 2010 @ 12:18pm | Report comment
Well I’ve personally seen lots of counter rucking. Teams are smart, they aren’t going to throw 4 players into a ruck if it achieves nothing. As for the mauls, you’re basically saying teams should be able to obstruct? Because as I understand it (correct me if I am wrong) the interpretations regarding mauls from lineouts are not new. What they are saying is that the player with the ball must not have anyone in front of him before an opposition player binds (and therefore the maul is formed), only then can the ball be moved to the back of the maul. I can remember at the 2007 RWC Tonga would just stand back and let england try and maul off lineouts, but because none of the Tongan players were binding, the English were penalised for obstruction (happened a couple of times in that match). So its not a new law. I don’t know if you read Spiro’s column yesterday, but he complained the maul was the only aspect of rugby without a contest for possession, because as you say, when the ball is at the back of the maul no opposition player is allowed direct contact with it. This doesnt look like changing anytime soon anyway. As far as I know the maul still exists much like it did in 2007. I’ll respectfully disagree about the rucks, because I’ve seen some pretty aggressive counter rucking in the Super 14 the last couple of weeks.
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 1:50pm | Report comment
ok i’m right there with you on lots of that Sam, but as much as we’re seeing counter rucking, it’s generally only when the ball slows and clustered defences see that there’s only two attacking player standing protecting the ball….it’s very rarely contested at the immediate point of tackle. On the mauling side of things, yeah i definately see what you’re saying, it has been a really up and down issue in rugby for a number of years and has become an area of great debate, it is largely down to interpretation, but i think it’s a bit naive to expect that defences are ever going to be in contact with the ball carrier in a maul, because that would essentially defeat the purpouse of forming one because it becomes extremely vulnerable…as much as it is essentially structured shepherding, it’s not like you ever see a team go 80 metres to the opposition try line is it?? it’s extremely hard to manufacture a good maul, which is why only few teams do it very well, it’s a hugely technical area of forward play and for me personally it’s an awesome part of the game to watch, always has been, and i just don’t see what all the fuss is about…it amazes me that there are people out ther who love and watch rugby who don’t throoughly en joy watching a powerhouse maul plow throught an opposition forward pack. But to each their own, there is always a contender to any opnion on any aspect of the game… that’s why we’re all here!
ohtani's jacket said | March 23rd 2010 @ 8:04pm | Report comment
I read what you wrote. I just don’t agree with any of it.
You want the old laws back at the breakdown, yet for the longest time people have been complaining that the breakdown needs fixing. So what’s it to be? People were complaining about the breakdown long before 2007. The type of turnovers you want to see return were not always commonplace in rugby. They evolved over time from the mid to late 90s on and many would argue became stronger than the attacking sides’ ability to clear the ball from a ruck (especially when aided by increased rights to the ball for the tackler.)
As far as I can tell from the Super 14, the game is being played how it often is at lower levels. For too long the game has been clogged at the higher levels. I don’t know what it will look like at Test match level, but I think you can find plenty of examples from the Super 14 that contradict what you’re saying in regard to physicality, otherwise how would sides win? The most recent rounds have hardly been track meets, have they? How can anyone suggest that the Bulls aren’t playing total rugby (or whatever you want to call it)?
The new interpretations take some getting used to and the rugby does appear a bit strange at times but NO sport looks like/is played like it was in 1995. 1995 or whenever people were most in love with rugby is never coming back. You could reset everything to 1995 and in ten years it would be something different. Sorting out negative play/restoring turnovers won’t stop the game from evolving into something you may not like.
Bondiplage said | March 23rd 2010 @ 5:42am | Report comment
Well said, Luke – I sometimes wonder if the IRB actually watches rugby. Would they have patted themselves on the back for the France/England game? I can’t recall two teams in recent tests working so hard for so little. The laws have made the ref the star of the show. Just one little toot on his whistle and 30 men stop playing, 80,000 people in the stands groan at yet another stoppage, and the commentators often as not wonder why the ref picked on that particular nit.
Motormouth Brian Moore said, in effect, on the coverage I was watching – French pictures which included aerial shots from Alpha Centauri – that there were so many laws to infringe upon that Mr. Lawrence was spoilt for choice. Are refs under orders, as Moore hinted, from the IRB to pay strict attention to even the smallest, most unassuming transgressions?
16 men shoving against each other and the law-makers want perfection. In the above mentioned game a crooked lineout throw resulted in a scrum that took five entire minutes to be resolved. And these are the laws that will be on show to zillions during the RWC.
Hey, IRB – come in from the golf course and watch a few of these matches. You’ve taken a once-great game and reduced it to a clogged mess.
James said | March 23rd 2010 @ 5:48am | Report comment
The scrum to me is the only area that really needs ironing out, the problem is that both sides strive so hard to get the upper hand on engage that if they fail they collapse. Easiest solution – no hit. Both teams bind and lean in, once the ball goes in then they can push and shove. It should keep things a contest without the endless barrage of collapsed scrums.
Also, stop the clock when a scrum is called and start it when the ball exits the scrum. That will stop teams intentionally collapsing to kill time i.e. the Tahs against the Force on the weekend.
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 8:48am | Report comment
mate, exactly!!! how bad was that france england game…..i got so frustrated…thank god for fox IQ! Another area that just makes me cringe these days is the scrum….not a single referee in circulation has any idea what’s going on and the rules they’re given to rule on at scrum time are by and large hugely contentious and contradictory to the motives on front rowers….on the weekend, can’t remember which game, but the ttacking team were 5 metres out and the ref gave a penalty against them for trying to collapse the scrum, to which the captain frustratedly contested “this is a close game and we’re losing, why on earth would we dream of trying to collapse our OWN scrum?!?!?!”
I say just make sure the ball goes in straight and let them go hell for leather….seems like our scrums are becoming more like league every day….either the ball is 100% definately going to the attacking team or there’s some kind of wrongfully given penalty! Go have a look at some footage of the 1995 world cup when the scrum laws were significantly simplified, it’s actually awesome to watch and adds to the spectacle of the match, a real contested scrum.
mitzter said | March 23rd 2010 @ 10:25am | Report comment
good point about scrums – no tight heads anymore, attacking ball or penalty!
I think training is a lot to do with this, they don’t know how to take the push anymore they just collapse when going backwards
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 2:10pm | Report comment
yeah, i often think that the most important things are just ignored and whatever the ref’s are told to focus on that week is all that they blow up…like what is all this holding the ball at the back of a ruck for 5 minutes?? they should have a limit to how long they have to get the ball out once it’s at the last feet. And they blow up the scrum when it collapses even when the ball is at the number 8′s feet…why??? just let them get it out, the scrum contest is over dammit!!
And again the biggest problem is the killing, when have you ever watched a game where there were no opportunities to score?? ever??? there always is, but some idiot dives on the ball or comes in offside or takes out the halfbacks hand or trips someone or knocks it down or something else daft and all thy get is a brief talking to and they concede 3 points..BIG DEAL!!! who wouldn’t do that…2 minutes later you could have kicked off to some bloke who knocks in on and you slot a droppy from the scrum or run through and get an intercept and all of a sudden …. penalty null and void….what’s the point?? the punishment needs to be more sever so blokes aren’t trained to do it
Firebrand Sally said | March 23rd 2010 @ 6:11am | Report comment
As “ohtani’s jacket” wrote above, “the problem with rugby is that every Tom, Dick and Harry has a different opinion about how it should be played.”
You could just as easily blame global warming for the demise of real forward play. How about the Super 14 groundsmen be made to keep the grass longer and heavily wet the ground in the hours leading uo to kick off. Rugby still works well in the northern hemisphere under heavy conditions.
The real reason Super rugby is stuffed is the attitude of the coaches, holding the forwards out of the ruck to protect their defence line.
Isn’t the answer to remove all the breakdown laws and just make it a free for all?
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 10:38am | Report comment
yeah alright hero, but even in the glorious northern hemisphere rugby still has the problem of players killing the ball in the red zone…which, in case you missed it, is the core point of the article. The current re-interpretations are the reason coaches have to take that attitude to forward play and defence, because when you’re on defence you don’t really have an option as breakdown competiors are just being blown, even if they’re not in the wrong. if you scrapped all this new interpretation crap and reduced the difference between a try and a red zone penalty you encourage teams to play in that area of the park and make it significantly more risky for teams to deliberately play outside the laws in defence, because giving away 5 is much worse than givign away 3.
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 10:40am | Report comment
and in case you can’t figure that one out too…..this would result in more attacking play and hoefully,more tries
Loftus said | March 23rd 2010 @ 7:02am | Report comment
O.k. article,just a shame about the last bit: ‘the farce that is penalty kicks from any further than 40m out ‘. I’m sorry,mate,if an opposing team breaks the rules and I have the best kicker in the world in my team,then I want to punish the opposing team and take my 3 points if I choose so.It’s quite difficult to kick a 50 metre kick under pressure and conditions.You must try it and you will see it’s not really a ‘farce’ and not a lot of players can do it.
mitzter said | March 23rd 2010 @ 8:02am | Report comment
nup it’s boring and stupid! field goals and penalties 2 pts so they still have an impact on a close game and introduce a red zone penalty of 3 or 4 pts inside the 22
Rusty said | March 23rd 2010 @ 8:16am | Report comment
so what you are saying is that instead of going for a try when a team is within the ’22 its more value for them to kick for posts than say when they are further out?
mitzter said | March 23rd 2010 @ 8:24am | Report comment
yep.
Look it’s needed as a deterent as has been pointed up above about consistent defensive penalties inside the red zone.
of course i want to see teams go for the try but i’m also a realist. Teams inside the 22 want points – that’s what referees use as their guide for penalty advantage anyway and they deserve meaningful points for earning the penalty in the 22. Will teams go for the kick inside the 22 – probably – but at least teams will be fighting hard to get in the 22 rather than be happy to fight in out on the halfway line
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 1:53pm | Report comment
and the idea is that if the deterran is great enough, teams will not try to kill deliberately but turnover within the rules to avoid losing a try’s worth of points…might as well just eventually let one in, right? if they can get there….
Rusty said | March 23rd 2010 @ 8:15am | Report comment
I agree Loftus – lets be honest its only those without the weaponary in thier arsenal that decry the act. If it was Berrick Barnes or Matt Giteau that kicked a 50m penalty kick to win a game for the Wallabies everyone would be hailing the glory of it.
Lee said | March 23rd 2010 @ 8:19am | Report comment
Larkham kicked a 48m drop goal in the semi of 1999 world cup to beat South Africa, not many Australias would call that boring…
mitzter said | March 23rd 2010 @ 8:30am | Report comment
You surely know that is b s. of course penalties and field goals have their place in the game (I’m in favour of 2 pts as said above) and the dramatic win from the final kick is a glorious elation (or heartbreak) but the whole game can not be built around the final seconds of the game and the HUGE accumulation of points by kicks (most points in the history of the game EVER) is boring and i think most people agree with me. It has nothing to do with not having a good enough kicker or anything like that!
Rusty said | March 23rd 2010 @ 11:59am | Report comment
infringements = penalties. Less value in penalties = more infringements which in turn would lead to more penalties as people chance thier arm more
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 8:54am | Report comment
hey mate, i’m a bok fan (also the author of the article) and we hve frans and morne steyn, i just honestly think it’s wrong….particularly if the penalty is given to you when you’re defending….how are you in a high percentage position to score points when 40 or more metres out?? it just doesn;t make sense…at minimum a penalty from 40+ metres should be worth less.
Believe me i love seeing frans steyn slot one from 60, it’s incredible and i envy the man’s talent and say sucked in to the teams who he slots them against but in all seriousness, do you really deserve points from out there?? I’m all for kicking in rugby, it’s an important foundation of the origins of the sport, but it shouldn’t be abused, nor the basis of a team’s plan….drawing penalties and playing until you draw one because you know that on 60% of the field you have an 85% chance of getting 3 points is just negative.
Rusty said | March 23rd 2010 @ 11:55am | Report comment
It too am a Bok and Stormers fan but its a question of balance isnt it. On one hand – we want the running game but its hard to do that when the other team is slowing your ball all the time to get their defensive line into place. I think this applies to both attack and defense the key is more to do with reducing your infringments than not rewarding the more focused team. So how do we punish them to prevent this from occuring – penalties and cards of course. There are a couple of options on what to do with that penalty but the one that gives you the best way to accumulate points at the lowest risk is kicking for poles. How pissed off would you be if your team decided to go for a try instead of poles and lost to a 2 point margin? Never mind that the player/captain/coach would be castigated for not taking the ‘easy’ points on offer. Thier livelihoods and careers are tied to those results and I very much doubt they want to ‘kick’ that away
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 1:24pm | Report comment
exactly why the penalties should be increased closer or equal to the value of a try
Just a Fan said | March 23rd 2010 @ 8:07pm | Report comment
Giving away penalties is negative – not scoring off them……
Just a Fan said | March 23rd 2010 @ 8:06pm | Report comment
Yeah – I agree with you there…if you don’t want the opposition scoring three points don’t offend! Find it strange that a Bulls supporter would be against taking penalty kicks from all over the park with Morne Steyn in the team.
Also don’t understand the fixation with the value of penalties/kicks/drop goals …part of the game, everyone knows, everyone plays to it.
Yes the new “interpretations” are a little frustrating right now – I for one do not enjoy the try fests, but the Stormers are getting it right, and it wont be long before other teams starting settling down too. (Bulls defensive play is shocking…..the attacking play is what winning them games…) For the past 3 or 4 years the rules in rugby have changed every year – lets hope things stay the same for a while so that the coaches and players can adjust properly.
preciouspress said | March 23rd 2010 @ 8:32am | Report comment
The IRB should remove all this ‘crouch, touch, engage’ rubbish out of scrummaging and limit the referee’s involvement to deciding – did the half feed promptly and straight, was there DELIBERATE dropping of the front row. Having made that change there then should be an embargo on any change in any of the laws for at least 5 years.
The IRB should also highlight good referees and indicate why they are effective. On the other hand they should demote the poor refs and tell us why. In last weekend’s 6 Nations the Ireland/Scotland game was enhanced by Kaplan whereas the France/England game was compromised by Bryce Whatsisname from NZ. Praise the former, counsel and retrain the latter.
Brett McKay said | March 23rd 2010 @ 8:33am | Report comment
not that I’m suggesting this should be done, but why wouldn’t increasing the values of tries be the same deterrant to decreasing penalty and field goals?
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 9:00am | Report comment
because increasing the value of tries creates the problem of further increasing the difference between a red zone penalty and a try, making it even more profitable for the defence to commit professional fouls in the red zone. The whole idea of decreasing the margin between a try and a penalty for ball-killing penalties in the red zone is that it makes it more high risk for the defensive team to risk playing outside of the law….recovering 5 points is significantly more difficult than 3…that way we don’t need to touch the drop goal, which i believe is a great part of the game.
Brett McKay said | March 23rd 2010 @ 9:56am | Report comment
Shocked, I’m sorry, but you’ve lost me..
Isn’t increasing the difference between tries and penalties the whole point of reducing penalites to 2pts? So why wouldn’t increasing tries to 6pts do the same thing?
And wouldn’t decreasing penalties to 2pts be even more incentive for defending teams to infringe on their own line??
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 9:58am | Report comment
dude what?? i’m suggesting penalties should be 5 points in the red zone for killing the ball…again, so as to deter teams from infringing. I never said to reduce the value of a penalty…..I said why would you leave everythin and increase the value of a try? that would create a greater incentive to cheat for defensive players
Brett McKay said | March 23rd 2010 @ 10:10am | Report comment
yeah sorry, I got delayed during that post, and by the time I hit Add Comment, your post immediately below was there, which of course explains everything…
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 10:15am | Report comment
haha no worries, you had me thinking i’d managed to somehow contradict myself!
Brett McKay said | March 23rd 2010 @ 10:39am | Report comment
and that’s exactly what I was thinking you’d done as I wrote that reply!! Your explanation below clears everything up, and I agree with most others here, the 5pt penalty in the red zone has plenty of merit..
BennO said | March 23rd 2010 @ 10:11am | Report comment
I’ve not heard that idea before but it’s got some merit I think. You definitely can’t just increase the points difference between a try and a penalty because as you say, it will just increase the “benefit” of an infringement on the line. A 5 point penalty inside the red zone would certainly help stop negative play when a team is really on the attack.
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 9:21am | Report comment
To Add onto the article…looks like they chopped it off….. A penalty in the red zone should be worth 5 points, equl to a try so as to deter teams from giving away the penalty 3 points to avoid 5 for try.
LT80 said | March 23rd 2010 @ 12:43pm | Report comment
Sorry to have to say it, but that’s a terrible idea.
This would lead to fewer tries because teams would now always kick for goal rather than go for the try when awarded a penalty near the line.
If you think about it mate, the problem is not the amount of penalties, it’s the amount of penalties that result in a kick for goal, which is often an anti-climax.
A better solution would be to REDUCE the value of a penalty goal, and introduce different penalties for repeated or deliberate infringements such as the sin-bin or send-off. Therefore we’d see less kicking for goal, but also less negative play.
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 1:25pm | Report comment
or, on the flip side, teams would not give those kinds of penalties away in those areas because it comes at too greater risk….
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 1:27pm | Report comment
and reducing the value of a penalty would just cause greater incentive to infringe everywhere, so that’s a significantly more horrific idea…the problem is not how many kicks are taken at poles it’s how many players are deliberately infringing the ball int he attacking red zone because risking 3 points makes more sense than risking 7
sheek said | March 23rd 2010 @ 9:32am | Report comment
While I thought OJ was on the money, I’ve paid attention to the body language of league & union players.
You watch the leagueies & they play as if there is no referee, they absolutely tear into each other.
You watch the unionists, & there’s that ever so slight hesitation – gee, I had better be careful here so I don’t get penalised.
But more often that not, they’ll get penalised anyway. It’s the Oedipus principle – no matter how you try to avoidyour destiny, it’ll happen anyway.
Rugby needs less laws, keep them to a bare minimum, mainly foul play & offside. Whether this would actually improve the action or not, let’s find out…..
arbitro storico said | March 23rd 2010 @ 8:52pm | Report comment
Rugby tried a game with less laws. It was called the ELV’s, and it was a shambles.
That’s the negative – here’s the positive; turn the game 90 degrees and play across the field. You’d have 100 metres width, and who needs more than 70 metres to score a try anyway? There’d be more space for the 15 blokes to find a gap, and the finest technical defence systems in the world would not cope.
Remember that you read it here first…
TembaVJ said | March 23rd 2010 @ 9:50am | Report comment
I like this idea shocked, 5 point penalty in the red zone but no 2 point conversion (only with a tri scored). 3 points 50M-22M and 2 points outside 50m.
Have to say there has been a lot less kicking this year, I am enjoying the games and think that the final stages are going to dish up some serious rugby.
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 9:56am | Report comment
would change it for good and we might actually see a lot of well-constructed tries!
drop kick said | March 23rd 2010 @ 9:57am | Report comment
Deliberate infringment inside the red zone – yellow card plus three point penalty. That would stop McCaw (Smith, Waugh etc). and if it didn’t stop them it would give the attacking side an advantage for the next ten minutes. Result: less killing of the ball, more tries.
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 10:53am | Report comment
yeah but what ref is gonna send richie mccaw off in auckland/dunedin against the boks in a tri nations decider…or the wallabies in a bledisloe decider?? they don’t have the marbles in the satchel mate
drop kick said | March 23rd 2010 @ 11:17am | Report comment
If that is the case are they going to have the marbles to award a five point penalty?
having different values for penalties depending on where they happen is going to make the game harder to explain to casual followers. Keep it simple.
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 1:28pm | Report comment
who cares about casuals…you’re either borught up with a sport and you’re passionate about it or you don’t really care anyway
shocked! said | March 23rd 2010 @ 1:57pm | Report comment
because it works like that for everyone and the team wouldn’t necessarily lose their captain unless it were for a repeated infringement, in which case there is even greater risk…imagine playing, and infringing twice in a row in which case your team has now conceded 10 points and lost you for 10 minutes…you’de be the biggest jackass in the world and probably wouldn’t be in the starting XV the following week….that’s that point
Sam said | March 23rd 2010 @ 12:22pm | Report comment
Yeah because referees never get it wrong right? Its bad enough when penalties are awarded wrongly, but the stakes just get higher for the referee now. Esp regarding killing the ball, its the most difficult area to referee as it is, without the added pressure of having to send someone off as well. All that would happen is what they have in soccer inside the goal box – less likely to penalise a defending player there than in other parts of the field because if they do they are almost obliged to give them a yellow or red.