Can Two Point Penalties Stop Boring Rugby?

http://i.stuff.co.nz/sport/rugby/opinion/9790198/Reason-Two-points-for-a-penalty-lets-try-it

Interesting thoughts that the scoring system may need to be tweaked again to promote positive rugby.

No. Reducing the points for a penalty will make teams more likely to give away a penalty than risk conceding a try.

Surely you're not suggesting Mark Reason hasn't thought it through?

There's nothing boring about rugby. If you don't like it you don't have to watch it. This is very typical of SH brethren. When they lose they always want to change the rules. Step away there's nothing to see here.

englandglory4ever wrote:There's nothing boring about rugby. If you don't like it you don't have to watch it. This is very typical of SH brethren. When they lose they always want to change the rules. Step away there's nothing to see here.

Mark Reason is English, is he not?

Yes. He's out of the same sort of school as Stephen Jones. A journalist who seems to be contraversial to get attention.

demosthenes wrote:No.  Reducing the points for a penalty will make teams more likely to give away a penalty than risk conceding a try.

+1

If you want to see fewer penalties drop the value of tries or raise the value of kicks, and tell Walsh to retire...

Raising the points for ties worked previously right?

I'd argue, like a couple of people already have pointed out here, that to cheapen the value of a penalty allows teams to infringe more without getting the same kind of punishment on the scoreboard.

Was this not tried at some club or college level before? I have a vague memory of something like 6pts for a penalty actually managed to reduce the level of infringements and resulted in more tries scored on average. last 10-15 years I think in the UK or Ireland.

I wouldn't entirely agree though that there needs to be a bucket load of tries for a game to not be boring. I've watched plenty of games that I have found very entertaining where the score would be 0-0, 3-3, 6-6 at half time but you know it is a real armwrestle with good tactics being applied and defended against.

What I do find boring is aimless kicks (with no chase). That is a give up play where a team has decided we just don't want the ball. And if the other side does the same turning the game into ping-pong then that gets boring.

Excessive re-setting of scrums I still find boring but again, when both packs decide to scrummage fairly they can be exciting.

Overuse of the TMO I find tedious and frustrating. I think behind the scenes that could be done much slicker and quicker. If there are 10 cameras in a ground, then give the TMO the 10 feeds all time-aligned and have the director give him multiple views simultaneously in the replay. Why do we all have to wait around for each camera angle to be replayed 10 times before they get to the one obvious angle that any director or broadcaster would logically know is the most likely angle to give the definitive view. Aarghh!! Annoys me just thinking of the mess in that part of the game.

NZ were probably the first team to start penalising as a matter of practice if they were at risk of conceding a try. This happened from the early 90s before the advent of yellow cards.

Reduce a penalties value and it will give incentives to give more penalties away.... if its less of a problem then its less of a risk to give away.

Want to reduce this cynical action... raise penalties value.

You would have to reduce penalties for such minor issues such as accidental offiside and questionable scrum collapses etc as it would get silly but I think it would work significantly better than lowering the number of tries.

This whole thing is a joke anyhow.

The recent rule changes have been a farce ... they screwed up big time over the ELVs issue which gave too much power to defensive teams.... you can contest this notion but the core facts are that try scoring was at its peak around 03-07 and beyond that it has dropped significantly.

Before the ELVs the Garry Owen was dinosaur extinct.... now its the primary attacking tool of near all sides... inc. NZ.

They made their bed, they should lie in it.

Rugby isn't boring.
If you want to see a free flowing game with dramatic end to end action, high scores and tremendous ball skills - watch basketball ! Me - I'd rather watch paint dry.

A rugby match played on a cold damp evening that ends as a 3 all mud fest can be a thing of beauty. As much as any free flowing try fest. If you don't agree - you may be following the wrong sport…..just a thought.

Less points for penalties mean defences will give you penalties to keep your try count down.
(which ironically might be counter productive if you're an attacking team going for tries!!!  As the idiots try to keep you from scoring them, you're bulking up your penalty rewards)

Meanwhile, more points for penalties means defences stay honest and dare you to score a try - theoretically!


So all in all!
2 points for a try
7 points for a penalty

Perfect running rugby.
OR
Eternal scrum battles to get the penalties.

It's all Catch 22 actually.  The important point is that sides and individual players should have the motivation to score tries (and thankfully most of them still do)  It's where the glory is for teams and individuals.  Everyone knows that's what the crowd respond to most enthusiastically. So, where there is a will, there is always a way.

The beauty of rugby is that there are so many different ways to play the game and so many different parts. The danger with any tweaking of rules is that styles of play become unbalanced, but then again constant tweaking is also needed to stop aspects being abused

Surely the key is still at the breakdown and scrum?

We need less resets in the scrum and quicker ball (a breakdown issue).

offload wrote:Rugby isn't boring.
If you want to see a free flowing game with dramatic end to end action, high scores and tremendous ball skills - watch basketball !  Me - I'd rather watch paint dry.

Agreed.  Basketball is one of the most boring up/down games on the planet.... as bad as tennis played from the back of a court (Grunt, return grunt, whine, grunt, screech, return screech, grunt........)

Also - question.  Why do tall people have to play basketball?  Answer: to give them an advantage with the basket being so high.  Response, but if all players now are basically as tall as each other, why do basketball players have to be so tall?  Rule seems to be that the basket must keep rising as the players keep growing to reach it?
It can often be so comical how quickly these long legged 7 footers get from one end of the court to another.  It's like 15 man rugby played in a kitchen - clautrophobic!

It's all about incentives. If conceding a penalty in your own half is worth 3 points and the kicker has, say, a 75% chance of making it, it's "worth" -2.25 points to you. So, if it's a choice between conceding a penalty and risking a try, it makes sense to concede the pen if not conceding it will cost you more points.

If you assume that the kicker's conversion percentage is similar to his pen percentage, you'll concede the pen if, roughly speaking, the opposition have a better than one third chance to score.

Up the value of a pen to 4 points. Now, on average it's -3 points to you. You'll only want to concede a penalty if the opposition has about a 50/50 chance to score. Raise the pen to 5 points and it becomes a 2/3 chance of conceding a try before you'll be better off giving away the penalty.

On balance, I am not actually sure that making a try worth 5 points was a good move. It was probably just that tactics hadn't caught up with the new breed of professional kickers whose averages had gone from 60-70% to more like 80%. As a result, teams were conceding penalties that just weren't worth conceding. As Martin Johnson once growled when accused of leading a team that didn't score enough tries, "It's not us that's giving away the penalties". The likes of Wilkinson, Jenkins, N. and Carter changed the dynamic of the game.

Picking up on offload's point, I watched the Eng v Denmark soccer friendly last night and realised why it was that I enjoy rugby so much more. So many of the actions in a soccer match are inconsequential: for a lot of the time the ball is passed around between players, tackles are made, and nothing really happens to change the shape of the game. It's punctuated by moments when one team finds or forces the other out of position and something happens, but they are relatively infrequent. You only really get ongoing excitement in a very open game, or when one team has to resist serious pressure for an extended period. At the other end of the scale, opportunities to score happen much more frequently in basketball, but the norm is score-counterscore and it's only in the context of the ebb and flow of the game that you can see an advantage for one team or the other. Neither pattern really does it for me.

What I like about rugby union is that every action is potentially significant. Every run is a potential break, every tackle could change the momentum of the game, every breakdown could result in a turnover. Oddly, the same thing applies to cricket: any ball is potentially a wicket or a 6 and even a dot ball can be decisive in the right circumstances.

By the same token, that's probably why I enjoy league less - the outcome of most phases of play is more predictable in advance: team in possession goes up the field a bit, tries again. It's only if there's a break or in the last couple of phases that teams are forced to adapt.

There's not that much wrong with rugby at the moment - heck, look at the England v Ireland game: may have been low scoring (3-0 at half time), but both teams were playing with intensity and inventiveness in attack and great courage and commitment in defence. Indeed, the low score was mainly due to outstanding defensive efforts allied with a couple of mistakes in execution near the try line. Very few times where either team kicked the ball away aimlessly - Ireland kicked more and didn't always execute the intended kick very well, but the intent was usually to do something constructive

There are a few tweaks that could improve things in terms of allowing the attacking side a bit more advantage in getting clean and quick ball - referees being stricter on tacklers rolling away and allowing fair release (Joubert was particularly tolerant of tacklers on the floor not really making much effotrt to stay out of the play) and on penalising jackalers who are really supporting their weight on their arms, plus pushing the defeinsive off-side line back a bit further (perhaps the Law should say 'clearly behind the back foot of the breakdown'?), but these are mostly just modifications to the existing interpretations rather than fundamental changes.

The thing is, rugby isn't changing to appeal to you or I (the fans who follow the sport).

They change to bring in the fans outside this group... as these are the people who will increase/decrease the profits of the game the most.

New fans, a wider network.

a zero try 6-6 draw may be great viewing for the avid fan but the fair weather fan, the ones who really matter.... they will not be interested. They want instant gratification, big hits, line breaks, tries scored.

Want they don't want is a strategic chess like battle.

We all spend money on tickets, shirts, subscriptions etc each year... Say 1000 euros a year right. We will spend that good or bad. Almost guaranteed. Say they put a big push to their traditional fans and we fork out an extra 100 euros per year.

Compare that to them reaching out to a new fan willing to spend themselves 1000 euros a year. When you look at it that way... 100 vs. 1000 its a no brainer, the new fan wins.

fa0019 wrote:The thing is, rugby isn't changing to appeal to you or I (the fans who follow the sport).

They change to bring in the fans outside this group... as these are the people who will increase/decrease the profits of the game the most.

New fans, a wider network.

a zero try 6-6 draw may be great viewing for the avid fan but the fair weather fan, the ones who really matter.... they will not be interested. They want instant gratification, big hits, line breaks, tries scored.

You could use that same argument about virtually any sport though, fa.  What are any of the other sports doing to attract me?  

I don't have a vendetta against other sports - I simply can't get entertained by many of them.  You watch football off and on and what do you get a lot of the time? - strategic mid-season (let's not try too hard here) nil all draws - and the fans are mostly happy!  They're too busy looking at charts and permutations to realise they've just been handed up a game that offered absolutely nothing to a non-football fan.  The game itself didn't happen - only the 'permutation result' that means something to rabid league fans.

I mentioned Tennis a while back too.  I loved watching tennis when I was a teen back in the days of McEnroe, Connors etc - rackets less powerful, more skill and instinct up close to the net - a dynamic game that didn't rely on absolutely boring Serve MPH stats that fans seem to like so much these days.  Maybe Tennis changed to attract more people in.  It did change - and it's lost me - a fan of the snappier, exciting version rather than the methodical back court, eternal rally drivel.

So, be careful what you wish for as you think the game must change to attract people who don't like the present version.  I'm sure these people have their own favourite sports.  Why should ours change so much to alienate genuine lovers so that 'bigger audience market' are attracted into it?  I like rugby as a warrior game of brute force, tactical chess, slick running beauty, set-piece power and guile.  I like it to be a bit disjointed and erratic in pace.  That's war.  Messy but intense.  And rarely indeed do rugby fans walk away from a rugby game where nobody has scored a point.  And even rarer is a rugby fan who would walk away from such a game content.

 

offload wrote:Rugby isn't boring.
If you want to see a free flowing game with dramatic end to end action, high scores and tremendous ball skills - watch basketball !  Me - I'd rather watch paint dry.

A rugby match played on a cold damp evening that ends as a 3 all mud fest can be a thing of beauty.  As much as any free flowing try fest.  If you don't agree - you may be following the wrong sport…..just a thought.

Wonderful comment,

My input. Make a try 5 points and conversion worth 4, also make a penalty worth 4.

That way a converted try is still a game changer but equally a penalty will punish you dearly too.

I feel like there have been way too many rule changes or changes in interpretation over the past 10 years. Can't we just leave a good thing alone?

Make a try 3 points and the conversion 4 points. After all scoring a try was originally to give the opportunity to score a goal. (conversion). Then make a penalty worth 4 points. But at the same time adjust the law to stop teams playing for penalties at scrum time.

Another option is to have differing types of full penalty. Some, say from a scrum could be used to create territorial advantage by retaining the throw in and others, breakdown infringement, foul play etc, a penalty that may be taken at the posts. Simple to implement and may even reduce the deliberate collapsing of scrums.

If favour more use of short arm free kicks escalating directly to yellow cards for repeat offenders. Let's keep the ball in play and stop the mindless place kicking and line outs.

GloriousEmpire wrote:If favour more use of short arm free kicks escalating directly to yellow cards for repeat offenders. Let's keep the ball in play and stop the mindless place kicking and line outs.

Didn't the ELVs try that? Escalation from a short arm penalty straight to YC is a bit extreme. Personally, I would like to see more short-arm quick taps but also better use of the extra 10 m rule. Give the players leeway to take a quick tap (i.e. not insist on it being taken exactly from the mark), and add ten yards if the opposition don't retreat sharply enough. That would create space and actively encourage running rugby.

GloriousEmpire wrote:If favour more use of short arm free kicks escalating directly to yellow cards for repeat offenders. Let's keep the ball in play and stop the mindless place kicking and line outs.

Rugby League?

Is there a factor that poor attendances down South require more and more "entertainment" on the pitch.

Brilliant comment above about basketball...and i agree thats the most boring game around...

Leave rugby alone...as people have said above...a rough tough 3 - 0 maul and scrum fest in thick mud can be just as exciting as glorified 7's...

SecretFly wrote:

GloriousEmpire wrote:If favour more use of short arm free kicks escalating directly to yellow cards for repeat offenders. Let's keep the ball in play and stop the mindless place kicking and line outs.

Rugby League?

Exactly Secret....GE you need to swap codes...

GeordieFalcon wrote:

SecretFly wrote:

GloriousEmpire wrote:If favour more use of short arm free kicks escalating directly to yellow cards for repeat offenders. Let's keep the ball in play and stop the mindless place kicking and line outs.

Rugby League?

Exactly Secret....GE you need to swap codes...

He doesnt like scrums either. Seems like a perfect fit.

even thought i played hooker, i definitely dont like the mess that is modern scrummaging. i would be in favour of 4 points for a penalty, 2 for a drop goal, and teams only being able to win free kicks from scrums, not penalties.

Nope but a 7 point drop goal might save us from some bloody useless attacking play.

No no no............  Please no!

Not 7 points for a drop goal.  I've had enough of flyhalves dancing around a field over and back, up and down as the commentators collect their drool in buckets waiting for the precious moment....

"He's..................... he's.... no another phase.....another phase.............. NOW!!!!!!!.....he's............................ and it's carried back in................... phase 67 now, this is unbelievable........................... and he's.......................he's.................He's IN THE POCKET!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!"

Feck the pocket!  Take you hands out of your pockets and go try to score a try.

Laws should be:

Drop goal: 1 point
Penalty: 2 points
Try: 5 points
Conversion: 1 point

Only "direct penalties" may be used for a shot at goal. Direct penalties are not issued from set piece except for dangerous or cynical play.

The maul is recognised as obstruction and removed from the game.

agree re "indirect" penalties. i so hate scrums being used as a means of getting kickable penalties.

also happy to see drop goals downgraded to 1 point, but only from open play. if a penalty advantage is being played and a drop goal scored that should equal the 3 (or 2 in your view) points from a penalty.

I would be happy to see scrums used as a weapon to generate penalties if the rulings weren't such a ridiculous lottery.

again i completely agree with you.

you know how braces straighten the teeth of kids. i would actually be happy to see some kind of "brace" for the front row that forces them to push straight and horizontal.

A game may be boring on a subjective basis but there is no such thing as boring rugby

i can't bear these people that think rugby means tries. Rugby is battle. Defence means as much as attack. I never cared about scoring tries but a turnover, that means everything to me.

The spectacle is not bigger than the game itself

and i played hooker for 7 years, and i'm not sure i ever remember a collapsed scrum! (admittedly a few years ago...)

Scratch wrote:A game may be boring on a subjective basis but there is no such thing as boring rugby

i can't bear these people that think rugby means tries. Rugby is battle. Defence means as much as attack. I never cared about scoring tries but a turnover, that means everything to me.

The spectacle is not bigger than the game itself

spare us the melodramatics. rule changes happen all the time. every year in fact. scrums are currently somewhat of a refereeing lottery, a bit less with the new rules so thats a step in the right direction. but no-one is claiming the laws are perfect.

quinsforever wrote:

Scratch wrote:A game may be boring on a subjective basis but there is no such thing as boring rugby

i can't bear these people that think rugby means tries. Rugby is battle. Defence means as much as attack. I never cared about scoring tries but a turnover, that means everything to me.

The spectacle is not bigger than the game itself

spare us the melodramatics. rule changes happen all the time. every year in fact. scrums are currently somewhat of a refereeing lottery, a bit less with the new rules so thats a step in the right direction. but no-one is claiming the laws are perfect.

Wouldn't expect you to get it quoins don't worry, though i am surprised if you were a hooker.

quinsforever wrote:again i completely agree with you.

you know how braces straighten the teeth of kids. i would actually be happy to see some kind of "brace" for the front row that forces them to push straight and horizontal.

Why would professional players who earn their livelihoods and reputations from winning want to always push straight and horizonal? "Wot's in it for us?" might be the mantra

The weird effects at scrum time aren't simply down to players being eternally bold... they're coached by professional coaches who know their jobs as well as a creative accountant knows how to find tax loopholes for his clients. Tricks are tricks. There have always been tricks, there have always been tricksters and there have always been former tricksters who coach present ones. An edge is an edge and sometimes that edge is illegal if the ref's mind is elsewhere or if the ref is soft on certain infringements. Yet another aspect of professional coaching - knowing ref habits to better exploit any loopholes he seems blind to.

fly, scratch, 20 scrums in a match leading to 10 penalties is not good viewing. it's not even part of the battle. it's a weakness that is contributing nothing positive to the match.

turnover ball is awesome.

the aim of scrums is to get either quick ball or go-forward ball, not kickable penalties.

quinsforever wrote:fly, scratch, 20 scrums in a match leading to 10 penalties is not good viewing. it's not even part of the battle. it's a weakness that is contributing nothing positive to the match.

turnover ball is awesome.

the aim of scrums is to get either quick ball or go-forward ball, not kickable penalties.

I'm not defending it, quins.  

I'm saying its a fact of life that 16 big men in a complex web of heads, necks, shoulders, groins, legs and battle-heat - heaving against each other in a sequence of rules designed to either force a penalty, show dominance, kill spirit, get quick ball etc - they will if they can work it, get away with things illegal in the melee to improve their odds.  It happens all over the field - forward passes, late hits, holding defenders back, obstruction, bringing down mauls illegally.  
You can clean up rules, have less rules or have more rules and bigger penalties.  But the truth is that professional players in a scrum will try cute things to give themselves an advantage - and they'll aften be coached to do so.  Now the ref can whistle them all off the field, but he knows that's impractical.  So he plays along with the mischief and penalises some of it and re-sets, re-sets, re-sets.  He's trying to achieve balance between letting a game happen and yellow carding the game off the field.  
And we all know scrums are for quick ball, go-forward ball, AND kickable penalties....AND to make physical statements.  There are many reasons for scrums and why sides want them

Exactly - it's a debacle - let's just get rid of it. It's unmanageable and hence provides a lottery in which one team unfairly benefits.

And leave drop goals out of it. When they become a significant part of scoring then go ahead and nerf them.

Reducing the relative value of a penalty will undoubtedly encourage more of them, yet paradoxically increasing the value will also encourage teams to try to con the referee into giving more of them. So that would indicate the status quo is fine - yet is it?

Far too many creative moves are spoiled by a cynical penalty in the red zone defying the referee to produce a card. If the game is close with not enough time for two scores, then not only is a penalty worth nothing on the scoreboard but a card is also devalued as there may be only a fraction of the 10 minutes left on the clock.

My solution is to split the current 3 point penalty into an automatic award of 1 point to the score, and have the remaining 2 points available as present. The whole point of a penalty is to stop infringements and so allow the game to flow according to the Laws, therefore the automatic 1 point would be added to the score irrespective of where the penalty happened on the pitch.

Poorfour made an interesting point above about the risk and reward percentages facing teams who decide to give away penalties. Having the automatic award of 1 point would increase the tariff, and in close games might make teams realise they cannot rely on the opposition not kicking for goal as every time they infringe the scores will get closer.

Having a penalty with an automatic 1 point to the score does what it says on the tin by materially penalising teams where it hurts, yet at the same time encouraging attacking rugby.