Is Rugby Sevens the future of the game?

Just to reiterate working class rugger, the woman’s games is vital key to the success of rugby taking a place at the Olympics. The IRB have worked extremely hard promoted and popularise the woman’s games and I think they have been successful in building a sport that fully deserves inclusion in the Olympics. The great success of the woman’s game was evident at the woman’s world cup when a hugely successful tournament ran alongside the men's with the final being played prior to the men's with a crowd of 30,000 supporters. On a smaller scale, I was at Newquay Surf 7s this weekend and the level of ability, passion and physicality in the ladies game was sky high and I can honestly say I enjoyed watching it as much as I did the men’s. If anyone doubts the multi gender appeal of sevens I highly recommend visiting a tournament and watching the ladies in action. just a quick point about weather 7s will upstage 15's not in a million years, I hope the rule are altered to dramatically as there is so much skill involved in ever facet of the 15's game and should not be changed in order to make it more viewer friendly.

Noem Sorry mate but I have to correct you there. Rugby 7's bid for inclusion in the London Olymplcs only had room for a male cpmpetition. This was sighted for the main reason why it missed out. This bid for the 2016 in Rio I think, has a women;s tournament structure as well. In all 16 men's teams and 12 -16 women's pending on the IOC's ideal format. From what I have gathered the delegates at this 7's WC were very impressed with the competitiveness and structure of the game particularly in the women's half. Matt I don't necessarily mean for 7's to replace the 15's game. But my question is focusing on how will it change it. As 7's becomes more and more popular 15's will need to begin to adapt more of the 7's style of play. As much as it pain me to say it but removing the front row (I'm a Prop) and only having 12 on the pitch might be the solution. Second Rowers are becoming increasingly athletic. Of course keep the line out, ruck and maul and contested scrums.

The IRB submission for the 2016 Olympics provides for a male only competition as opposed to male/female participation in golf, karate, squash & roller sports. Might be a problem. Also Rugby is nowhere near as universally popular as Roar rugby aficionados like to make out. There are 202 National Olympic Committees and rugby is the major football code in just 4, New Zealand, Fiji, Samoa & Tonga. Wales is part of Great Britain in the Olympic context and in South Africa rugby is the white man's game. To become an Olympic sport the aspirants need a 2/3 majority vote from the IOC members of which currently there are 107. The key date to watch out for is 13th August when the IOC Executive Board meet in Berlin & are expected to make a recommendation on two sports for final consideration by the IOC in Copenhagen on the 9th October. This will also be the same session that decides the host city for 2016. The vote might end up as it was in 2005 when no new sports were added.

7s in the Olympics would make 7s the standard for union around the world with 15s as an offshoot popular in the same handful of places as it currently is.

The only flaw with Sevens is the length of the games. Games are too short to really create a replacement for XV's. The games have to be short because of the physical toll they take on the players to cover that much space. If the game of rugby were to lower the number of players, they would have to visit the idea on also changing the substitution policy as well. To keep the pace and intensity up for 80 minutes, you would have to use an interchange system like League. This is something I feel should be done regardless, but that is my opinion. Obviously American football is a different game and I feel unlimited substitutions like that would hurt rugby, however it is something to consider a possible choice, especially if you went with as few as 10 or 11 players.

Sevens won't be at the London games. This vote is to include it in the 2016 games. I don't agree that golf is a done deal here. Maybe I am seeing what I want to see, but golf doesn't embody the Olympic ideals at all. It is a rich White man's sport. Why would people want to watch a bunch of stiffs slap balls around a park in search on a gold medal? On top of that, it is an individual sport. I know people will bring up the Rider Cup as an example of "team play," but lets be serious here. Only a handful of nations would have enough golfers to compete on a team basis, so you are back to watching the same PGA guys playing for themselves. Don't kid yourself that an Olympic golfer wouldn't be thinking solely about a possible revenue boost after "bring home the gold." No, Sevens is a great team sport that could possible make stars out of a few individuals. People like stories and I could only imagine how powerful they could be coming from the poorer rugby nations. I feel that Sevens is the right choice for the Olympics because of its inclusive nature. Men and women, rich and poor, youth and experience all make Sevens the better choice.

WCR - there have been quite a few calls over the years to reduce a rugby union team to 13 players and keep more or less the same rules. There have also been calls to add more players to Sevens and see a game that features forwards as well as backs. I can see an 11-a-side game based on the present Sevens with perhaps a four-man scrum that's as fast and efficient as the present Sevens scrum. Perhaps a five-man lineout. It would be a great chance to ace all the absurd rules that have crept into the 15-a-side game, and produce a new kind of game featuring not only fast running but also power running and power tackling. In short, the essence of rugby without the tiresome up-and-unders, resets and penalties. But it's the present Sevens that's being considered for the Olympics and it's got a fight on its hands. Golf is lobbying the IOC hard with some name players, and golf's argument is that it's gender-inclusive while Sevens is mostly male. Golf will probably make it as it's enormously popular with advertisers. We can discount baseball and softball because it was just recently kicked out, and London doesn't want it anyway as the local Olympic committee is starved for funds as it is. That leaves roller sports, squash and karate up against Sevens. London would have to build doubles courts for squash, while there are many stadiums ready to go for Sevens which will count hugely in its favor. Great to see Russia come to the fore. BTW, a European team, Germany, won silver in rugby at Paris in 1900, then soccer took over.