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In 1984, the Wallabies, under the scrum coaching of Alec Evans, monstered the Welsh pack at Cardiff Arms Park. This brought to prominence, with Topo Rodiquez as one of the props, the Argentinian method of scrumming. Their national side had developed, and are taught, the bajada.
This is the scrum moving forward after the hit with little steps, which became the Pumas main source of rugby strength, along with Hugo Porta’s wonderful kicking game.
Up until then, except in South Africa where scrumming was always a priority, the rest of the rugby world regarded scrums as a way to put the ball into play and restart the game.
It was not until the 1920s that the UK accepted the New Zealand idea of having designated positions in the scrum. This was an invention by NZ rugby.
The Springboks, even in their tour of NZ in 1921, played the system used in the UK in which the first forwards to scrum formed the front row and so on.
The Springboks learnt from that tour and went back to South Africa and developed the 3-4-1 scrum.
NZ continued using the famous diamond 2-3-2 scrum, with the eighth forward playing as a wing forward. When NZ toured South Africa in 1928 they continued to play their 2-3-2 scrum with the wing forward packing into the front row for the NZ feed.
The IRB changed the laws on scrums in 1931 enforcing a three-man front row. This meant the end of the 2-3-2 scrum.
The 1937 Springboks touring NZ and Australia won their first and only three Test series in NZ in a decider at Eden Park when they scrummed the All Blacks off the park.
At that, time teams had the option of a scrum when the ball went into touch. The Springboks opted for scrums instead of lineouts.
It took NZ rugby until 1956 to get the hang of scrumming. On their 1949 tour of South Africa they had to co-opted a Springboks selector, Danie Craven, to tell them the secrets of the 3-4-1 scrum.
But right through to the 1980s it was not uncommon in NZ and Australia to use second-rowers as props. Nick Shehadie and Tony ‘Slaggy’ Miller were two Australian examples of this, and Ken Gray was a NZ example.
This brings us to the 1980s and the Argentinian influence. The point here is that Argentinian rugby has always been strongly influenced by contacts with South Africa.
From 1984, Australia and NZ joined with South Africa, Argentina, England and France in trying to create dominant scrums.
But with the power scrums, there has been a corresponding increase in the number of neck injuries when scrums go wrong.
In Australia, a way around this was to de-power scrums at the a schoolboy level. And in schoolboy internationals, scrums are not allowed to move forward more than a metre or so.
The effect of this in Australia is that smart coaches of schoolboy sides have been using loose forwards in the front row.
There has been a lack of tough young fatties coming through to senior and provincial rugby here in Australia. Those props with the correct build to play the front row come into the big time with little or no scrumming technique.
So, in Australia, you get the Bill Young factor. This is the prop who is not big enough, strong enough or skilful enough to scrum consistently well. He gets through his matches by playing tricks, dropping the scum when he can’t hold the hit and so on.
The master of the Bill Young ploy is Al Baxter. Last season with Bill Young as the Brumbies scrum coach and Baxter as the senior prop for the Waratahs, the Brumbies and the Waratahs lead the Super Rugby tournament in reset and collapsed scrums.
The crouch-touch-pause-engage mantra was introduced by the IRB to ensure the scrum engagement is as safe as a collision of two packs of around 900kgs can be. This season, the time before the engage call has been extended to about 8 seconds.
The IRB claims that there are fewer resets under this system.
Certainly when the South African and New Zealand teams are playing each other or other local sides the system works. But it fails when Australian sides, especially the Waratahs, are involved. Is there a reason for this?
I’d like to see the scrum retained as a contest. It is part of the DNA of rugby as a game for all shapes and sizes where the contest for possession of the ball is the essence of the game.
The IRB needs to consider a number of points raised by the insightful readers of The Roar:
1. The jerseys of the props need to be of a material (cotton?) that can be grasped with some ease;
2. The nearest touch judge should stand on one side of the scrum and the referee on the other to ensure that props on the blind side of the referee scrum legally;
3. When the ball is almost out or out and the scrum goes down, play on;
4. Instead of penalising a prop for lowering an arm to the ground to get his balance, allow props to do this to ensure that the front rows stay up;
5. Change the call to crouch – touch – SCRUM;
6. The SCRUM call should come straight after the touch call; it makes no sense forcing packs to hold back for seconds when they are primed to engage.
Too many teams are penalised for scrumming early when they move on the ‘en’ syllable of the engage call. A word like scrum, one syllable solves this problem.
It is one of the great rugby skills when a side unleashes a strong scrum.
It would be a pity to lose this because of confused rulings from the IRB which can be easily fixed up.
If there is a will to do this.