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Once again, World Rugby has seen fit to tweak the laws of the game. Six new amendments were announced today, with a couple of typically confusing ruck interpretations dominating discussion.
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However, it’s the ones around the scrum that should really be getting questioned – mainly because they are so completely unnecessary.
Here’s how they are explained by the governing body:
Law 20.5 & 20.5 (d) 5: The scrum-half must throw the ball in straight, but is allowed to align their shoulder on the middle line of the scrum, therefore allowing them to stand a shoulder width towards their own side of the middle line.
Law 20.9 (b): The number eight shall be allowed to pick the ball from the feet of the second-rows.
Law 20: Once the ball touches the ground in the tunnel, any front-row player may use either foot to try to win possession of the ball. One player from the team who put the ball in must strike for the ball.
If there was any more evidence needed that there are too many people with a legal background and too much time on their hands involved in the upper levels of rugby, this is it. None of these changes will make the slightest bit of difference to the way the game is played, and are responding to issues in the game that simply don’t exist.
Scrums have come a long way since the days of 16 guys simply crashing into one another like some sort of medieval battle. Back then, when contesting for the ball by opposing hookers was actually a thing, the above changes might have made sense.
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But it hasn’t been like that for a long time, basically since the dawn of the professional era. Scrums are still an incredibly important part of the game, but possession changes at the discretion of the referee rather than any fleet-footed work by a hooker. A powerful eight man shove will draw a penalty on either defence or attack, and the rare tightheads that happen are won by simply walking over a static ball.
It’s time the lawmakers stopped trying to make out that the feed of the ball into the scrum is some sort of sacred part of the game. It smacks of resentment against rugby league and the fact that the 13-man code treats scrums as an excuse to have a quick rest.
As a fan, ask yourself when the last time you saw a ref ping a halfback or hooker for a feed or striking infringement? As a player, when was the last time this even got pulled up in lower grades?
When it comes to the number eight picking the ball up at the back, it’s hardly as if the extra milliseconds they’ll get from this change will revolutionise the game. Let’s face it, a quick look at any scrum anywhere will show you that most number eights are doing it anyway.
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You can add these to the seemingly endless waste of time rules and amendments of rugby, like the change from place kicking to drop kicking kick-offs (what exactly did that achieve?), the annoyingly bureaucratic protocol between referees and TMOs that doesn’t actually mean anything anyway, or what actually constitutes offside.
Instead of wasting their own time trying to over-govern something that should be just a regulation way to restart play, how about the lawmakers focus on something that needs it. Because we all know there’s one big issue they don’t seem to want to deal with.
Absolutely spot on article. Been saying the same thing for years now, the scrum is a complete waste of time these days.
It's gone from being a means to re-establish the game during a moment of mixed decisions to basically a free throw to the putting in team. What happened to the ball having to be put in straight down the middle and a fair fight being played out by the hookers?? You never, ever, see it these days, making the hookers position in the scrum redundant.
Nothing boils my piss more when I see the ball being fed in at an angle, virtually to the feet of the second row, it was happening time and time again in the England v Scotland 6 Nations game yesterday but not once did the ref flag it up. What's the bloody point of a scrum then?? May as well just hand the ball to the feeder and let him run with it.
It's turned the scrum from an all out battle, to one of penalty hunting. Teams now are only interested in turning, lifting or steering the opposition into giving up a penalty, that was NEVER why the scrum was invented!!
Just do away with the scrum, the game has killed it off anyway.