Law changes needed to improve the game

Axel Foley has some ideas on how to improve the game. Here they are:

1. The scrum:
Have the front rows crouch, engage, get steady and then feed the ball into the scrum would result in quicker set-up times and reduce the need for three front-row replacements on the bench.

The reason:
“The way it originally was before a team in black with a white fern decided that that wasn’t good enough for them, that they couldn’t beat South Africa because they were bigger men, so they brought a more dynamic hit into it,” said Foley.

   You need to go back and look at what was good in the game, because the game was always protected because the big players had to scrummage, maul, there wasn’t a lot of stoppages in the game, they didn’t have a lot of substitutions.”

2. Subs
Reduce the number of subs allowed.

To reduce the stoppages in the game to allow for substitutions and as players get tired, mistakes are made, defences loosens up.

3. The breakdown
Reintroduce old fashioned rucking to discourage lying on the wrong side of the ball.

Full interview here.

What do you think?

http://www.the42.ie/anthony-foley-world-rugby-laws-scrum-subs-2051292-Apr2015/

Not sure about 2, but I'd be happy to see 1 and 3 trialled

1) Agree - have to be strict on any early pushing

2) Agree - At top level have an independent medical assessor and only allow replacement for injury

3) Where we will have a problem. I do agree, but the public image of raked backs etc would not be good. We should also remove the law change that allows people to keep hold of the ball after the ruck has formed, be extremely strict on people off their feet. We do not have rucks anymore, we just have people lying down. this is made worse as the only successful method of clearing a man with hands on the ball is to pull the down.

The ruck is a nightmare, how many times did I see someone illegally supporting their weight on the tackled player and get away with it, or players being cleaned out way beyond the ruck, or referees allowing players to counterruck and leave their feet, or tackle assists never releasing.

How World Rugby expects any referee to ensure ruck play is legal with so many laws is beyond me.

And then you get the inconsistencies between referees, and they miss one thing and then another.

I don't even know if it is justifiable to say teams must adapt to a referee during 80 minutes of play when he is inconsistent in what he sees.

The Scrum is not even worth talking about, how many matches in the World Cup is going to be won via a scrum penalty?

1 makes no sense. They are not allowed to push before the ball is put in now. What is the difference?

I am not sure 2 is practical. Others have suggested only allowing subs if independent doctor agrees but if a player tells the doctor they have taken a blow to the back or head for instance the doctor will have to give permission for them to leave or risk being sued.

3 is a great idea. Bring back rucking! It will not happen though as it does not look good on TV.

Based on previous efforts I am sure of one thing - the blazers will manage to make the game worse. If they want to make some changes they could start by reversing some of their previous changes. In addition to restoring rucking they could for instance go back to no lifting in the line out. This would be much safer and involve less penalties.

I foresee that they will try and depower the scrum to help out Australia yet again. Personally I think if the Aussies prefer League to rugby just let them play league and stop messing about with our game.

Exiledinborders wrote:they could for instance go back to no lifting in the line out. This would be much safer and involve less penalties.

How about lifting for kick off receipts - though is this actually legal?

Exiledinborders wrote:1 makes no sense. They are not allowed to push before the ball is put in now. What is the difference?

They do push before the ball is put in.

I am not sure 2 is practical. Others have suggested only allowing subs if independent doctor agrees but if a player tells the doctor they have taken a blow to the back or head for instance the doctor will have to give permission for them to leave or risk being sued.

You will still be able to make five substitutions. It just means your bench is for injury, not impact.

3 is a great idea. Bring back rucking! It will not happen though as it does not look good on TV.

Let the tvs not do close ups of them then!

Based on previous efforts I am sure of one thing - the blazers will manage to make the game worse. If they want to make some changes they could start by reversing some of their previous changes. In addition to restoring rucking they could for instance go back to no lifting in the line out. This would be much safer and involve less penalties.

I don't think there are that many penalties from lineouts. If there are any problems it is usually a mistake by the lifters.

I foresee that they will try and depower the scrum to help out Australia yet again.  Personally I think if the Aussies prefer League to rugby just let them play league and stop messing about with our game.

The scrum was always only a way of restarting the game. Its just boring if teams just play to win penalties from the scrum.

Where do people get the idea the All Blacks couldn't compete with the Boks at Scrum time
that was only true 1937-49.Certainly the Scrum being formed up by rows as was the norm
for about 100years made sense there were few collapses.
That did`nt stop squint feeds and antics of the front row mafia though,would like to see the
old rules of players being able to detach reinstated plus the crotch bind[as practiced Lions 71/74 period]
Scrum was indeed used as an instrument to grind teams down but is negated by squad
system.
The ruck as practiced by NZ will never return players killing the ball be trampled would
never be allowed in this age.IF indeed any coaches were capable today of coaching it
Cavanagh style.

emack2 wrote:Where do people get the idea the All Blacks couldn't compete with the Boks at Scrum time
that was only true 1937-49.Certainly the Scrum being formed up by rows as was the norm
for about 100years made sense there were few collapses.
That did`nt stop squint feeds and antics of the front row mafia though,would like to see the
old rules of players being able to detach reinstated plus the crotch bind[as practiced Lions 71/74 period]
Scrum was indeed used as an instrument to grind teams down but is negated by squad
system.
The ruck as practiced by NZ will never return players killing the ball be trampled would
never be allowed in this age.IF indeed any coaches were capable today of coaching it
Cavanagh style.

“The way it originally was before a team in black with a white fern decided that that wasn’t good enough for them, that they couldn’t beat South Africa because they were bigger men, so they brought a more dynamic hit into it,” said [Anthony] Foley.

Sean Fitzpatrick's front row introduced the hit to negate the innate strength of the boks. Before then the front rows only went to work once the ball was actually put in.

Sin é wrote:

Exiledinborders wrote:1 makes no sense. They are not allowed to push before the ball is put in now. What is the difference?

They do push before the ball is put in.

They do indeed. But does that make Exiled's point invalid? I thought the RULE was that pushing was not allowed but that it's simply crept back into the mix because referees are again being casual with some rules and ultra strict on others.
Is the Rule not to push before the ball is put in? I thought that was the rule, that you were only allowed steady. So Foley's number one point didn't make much sense to me either.

People will obviously clarify.

Yes,
The law does state no pushing before the ball is put in.
The law also states the ball must be put in straight................

So Foley is saying an existing law should be in place because he's forgotten it already is in place because refs don't often enforce it?

SecretFly wrote:So Foley is saying an existing law should be in place because he's forgotten it already is in place because refs don't often enforce it?

I think he was just saying that there should be no pushing before the ball be put in (which there is at present). His law change is to do with substitutions.

foley wrote:
I think the game has too many stoppages in it,” said Foley at a Guinness Pro12 event in Kingspan Stadium yesterday.

“I think from my end, once we can get a handle on the scrum, no pushing before the ball, square and steady, put the ball in, then scrummage: that would be great. That would allow you to have five substitutions, I’d like to go back to five substitutions.

“At the moment, you can substitute half your team. If you had five, it’s only a third of the team. Less stoppages in the game, get the TMO decisions quicker. I think there is a place for the TMO, but it needs to be quicker.”

There should be no pushing.  But who asks the Refs en-masse why they are allowing the pushing?
There should be no crooked put-ins.  Who asks the Refs why they still allow it?
There should be no WAY-OFF throw-in to a lineout.  Why does it still so blatantly often happen?  Only the truly banana shaped throws seem to get called out now.  The rest are let glide by (directly to their own men) without a blink from refs.

Who is responsible for keeping Refs consistent?  Why does this guy or this organisation never be called to give an interview by the journalists?  Why don't journalists ask why players and teams are completely baffled by one ref and yet operate smoothly with another one the following week?

Where's the bloody consistency of refs???!!! -  is the main fighting point.  And someone in World Rugby authority needs to come out and answer those concerns.  Refs making up their own rules as they go along is becoming the greatest bone of contention - not the rules themselves - how refs are interpreting them through an 80 minute game from one game to the next.

A good starting point to improve the game would just be apply all the current laws, rather than just having individual referees interpret them as they see fit.

Of those 3 points 1 is the one which has the most legs I think, despite the recent changes, the scrum is still a farce.

Something does need to be done about the ruck, but its hard to see how a return to a good shoeing that would be an image of the game that the bigwigs would want to portray.

...a good shoeing would have its consequences of course.  Yes, there would be images that the children would become squeamish about - blood streaming down arms, legs, or indeed faces.  Them studs can do damage.

There would also be many more blood injuries disrupting games - on again, off again nonsense that can even bamboozle a ref, and there might even be bloody 16 players on one team at some points....

But I think the main consequence would be the elephantine memory of players.  Being studded creates memories of the player who did it to you.  You note his name, his address, his bloodtype into your memory bank and wait for your moment to give a response.  Hits could become very very personal indeed in a game already in the dock on the dangers of full blooded hits.

SecretFly wrote:So Foley is saying an existing law should be in place because he's forgotten it already is in place because refs don't often enforce it?

Umm, errr, welllll, YES.

There's nothing inherently wrong with most of the laws, it's mostly in the enforcement. Why squint feeds are ignored and crooked line-outs are (mostly) penalised is odd. I guess lineouts are more obvious to the crowd and are the ref is 'reminded' of these with more vigour?

Cyril wrote:There's nothing inherently wrong with most of the laws, it's mostly in the enforcement. Why squint feeds are ignored and crooked line-outs are (mostly) penalised is odd. I guess lineouts are more obvious to the crowd and are the ref is 'reminded' of these with more vigour?

Agree, most of the problem seems to be non-enforcement (ex: scrum feed) or inconsistent enforcement (ex: breakdown) of the laws.  I would much prefer to sort out play by the current laws before starting to rewrite them.  Not at all sure why the officiating at the top levels cannot be more consistent.  We know there are many things going on at any point in time, but scrum feed, not supporting body weight in the breakdown should be on the simple side of things.

Leaving your feet seems to be a huge problem at ruck time. Players are now frequently clearing out by throwing themselves like projectiles at players who are legally jackaling for the ball.Something has to be done about this for sure.

For me the scrum is a difficult one. I proposed a “Blue Card” system, similar to citing.

Let me explain:

As a prop myself I implemented the traditional skulduggery you see at scrum time. I’m being a little hypocritical here but I would like to see penalties at scrums cited after the match.

The ref’s have a difficult job to do as it is and to be honest the players rightly or wrongly stretch, bend and break the rules to see what they can get away with. We don’t want to see a precession of collapsed scrums in the matches but equally we want to retain an important skill set and facet of the game we love, otherwise we would all just convert to league…

So my suggestion would be to cite forwards and Scrum halfs who break the rules at scrum time. The referee on the day does not always have the luxuary of time. So let’s force the players to play within the confines of the game better. All scrums will be reviewed on TV after the game. Any player to be shown not binding properly or not driving/feeding the ball straight will be given a blue card. A player who receives 2 blue cards will be banned for 3 matches. If the said player keeps his nose clean for a month his original blue card will be rescinded.

This will have no impact on a penalty try awarded for skulduggery at the time but will hopefully force players to play by the rules assisting the refs and allow the game to flow at the same time.

Yes, but they might still have won an important game because of the skulduggery through a game.  

A Blue Card would nail a distinct player but the side still gains a big potential bonus of having won a game because of it.

Teams don't mind cards as long as the incrementally win the games - you see this when players blatantly give away penalties in a close games rather than conceding a try.  It's a decision to win the game first then worry about what cards we might have and what colour they are.

I still think refs have eyes enough to see most of what's going on - or their assistants have.  It's simply that some are overly officious and get criticised for it whilst others are too casual and can get criticised for that too.

There should be one set of laws (NH and SH) and referees should not be allowed such breath to their interpretations of such laws.

RuggerRadge2611 wrote:Leaving your feet seems to be a huge problem at ruck time. Players are now frequently clearing out by throwing themselves like projectiles at players who are legally jackaling for the ball.Something has to be done about this for sure.

For me the scrum is a difficult one. I proposed a “Blue Card” system, similar to citing.

Let me explain:

As a prop myself I implemented the traditional skulduggery you see at scrum time. I’m being a little hypocritical here but I would like to see penalties at scrums cited after the match.

The ref’s have a difficult job to do as it is and to be honest the players rightly or wrongly stretch, bend and break the rules to see what they can get away with. We don’t want to see a precession of collapsed scrums in the matches but equally we want to retain an important skill set and facet of the game we love, otherwise we would all just convert to league…

So my suggestion would be to cite forwards and Scrum halfs who break the rules at scrum time. The referee on the day does not always have the luxuary of time. So let’s force the players to play within the confines of the game better. All scrums will be reviewed on TV after the game. Any player to be shown not binding properly or not driving/feeding the ball straight will be given a blue card. A player who receives 2 blue cards will be banned for 3 matches. If the said player keeps his nose clean for a month his original blue card will be rescinded.

This will have no impact on a penalty try awarded for skulduggery at the time but will hopefully force players to play by the rules assisting the refs and allow the game to flow at the same time.

As a prop myself I can tell you that skullduggery never came into my play. I had a simple philosophy to scrumming, beat my opponent to the bind and hit straight.

I rarely lost a battle and never had to resort to skullduggery. Hence for me the scrums and laws around the scrums are a huge let down

I was trying to put the responsibility on the player to play within the confines of the rules, thus giving the ref's a fighting chance when the bulk of the skulduggery goes unnoticed.