Getting better all the time: Why rugby is the best it has ever been

Everyone who has read my articles consistently knows I love history. I like the threads that bind humans to the past.

I don’t assume we always know better than those who came before us. I love the stories of rugby; the evolution in the early days. I tend to go to history to understand the present.

But this should not translate into ‘good old days’ syndrome.

Rugby is better now.

The issue is will it continue to improve? Or will the forces and counter-forces that make up the tapestry of the world order of rugby conspire to stagnate union?

First, let me prove that rugby is better, as a spectacle and as a sporting code. The most important proof of this is the shape of the game.

From the time rugby became professional until now, the ratio of breakdown-to-set piece has gone from a mere 2:1 or 3:1, to its current 10:1. This is not merely due to the increase of actual ball-in-play (43-45 per cent of the time now, up from the mid-to-high 30 per cent level before 1995).

Knock-ons are a lot less frequent. This means that in times past, we could expect 27-30 scrums a game (a fact all of us who played in the 80s and early 90s remember all too well). Now, less than 15 scrums are frequent (8-12 is becoming a norm), and there are games when it is almost half-time before a scrum occurs.

The scrum is essential to rugby. Quite frankly, it is the organising principle still for the game and for forward selection, and remains a dangerous means of triggering attacks on the opponents’ line.

But given that collapses and resets and penalties are more common than easily-functioning scrums (and it is worse when top teams play each other), clearly the fewer-scrum change is a good development.

The conundrum is this. Lineouts and scrums are still the best means to score tries. Typically, more than half the tries scored come from these old familiar set pieces. But teams are becoming better at retaining their own lineouts, and thus, creating these try-triggers involuntarily is more difficult.

Also, while defensive pressure does create a scrum, most teams have better ball-handlers across the park than ever before.

For all the moaning about kicking nowadays, the halfbacks kick a lot less now than in the good old days. This is indisputable, outside of knockout rugby where teams kick 50-75per cent more than in other games.

In decades prior, a 50-punt game was normal, even 60 was typical. Now, a 40-punt game seems like a kick-fest.

This has resulted in lineout numbers plummeting, too from 37-39 a game to 20-24.

With the ball more in play on the field without handling errors, what we see now in top-level rugby is a quantum leap in passes.

In 1995, a 150-pass Test match was wide-open. Now, 260-275 passes in a game is not uncommon.

A spun backward pass is one of the quintessential rugby characteristics. This is more so than a kick or run, which has its antecedents or facsimiles in soccer or American football.

If done at speed, with two hands, fixing the defender, then a pass is the best attacking fulcrum in rugby.

All of this also translates into more tackles, and is there anything more satisfying for the true rugby fan than a proper or dominant tackle?

And thus, the rucks and mauls of rugby are up three times or more from the old day. It is not shocking at all to see 160-170 rucks in a game.

The breakdown is a more dynamic competition to watch. I would much rather watch David Pocock or Francois Louw ply their artful trade while Brodie Retallick or Willem Alberts try to clean them out, than see Adam Jones and Jannie du Plessis grapple.

The other thing about rugby, for all its grumpy detractors, is that the team who wins is almost always either the team who scores the tries – about 85 per cent of the time. Only about 1-3 per cent of the time does the team who wins the game score less tries. This is also a welcome change.

High-phase ball is still rare, because it does not work very well. About 75 per cent of tries come from movements with three or less phases.

As the phase count goes above ten, it becomes extraordinarily tiring and it becomes likely that the attacking team will spill the pill or run into infringements. As the rucks get messy they may win a penalty which they cannot turn down.

Avoiding the ruck altogether, or clearing it very quickly, is an All Black belief. They do it by passing 9.5-10.0 times per minute of possession, a lot compared to England’s or Ireland’s more pedestrian 8 pass/minute average.

South Africa is currently the multiple personality disorder team of passing. At times, it is off the charts, in other games, they are the stingiest of passers.

It is indisputable that the athletes we watch today are bigger, stronger, faster and more athletic than those we once revered.

Fatigue is a fact of rugby. About 55 per cent of tries come in the second half, as attrition creates space and tackle-cowards.

As this becomes the dividing line between success and failure, coaches may find ways to shrink space on the field and counter-trends may develop.

I love the memory of sweeping length-of-the-field tries from the old days, but when I actually sit down and watch those games, I realise there were some pretty dour contests

Today is the best time in rugby.