State of the Game
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in before the mods do it.
We have two different "state of the game" discussions going on in two threads.
Everyone knows my thoughts on modern professional rugby, i bore you guys with them all the time
But, for i think the first time, i am starting to see my thoughts echoed all over, and not from the usual suspects. Northern fans and media are starting to cotton on to the fact that trench warfare is incredibly dull to watch.
Part of me suspects it's England's fault. The celts hate that they are winning again, so it's the game's fault. But they are just the best exponents of it.
The game has so many serious issues. Club power and season structures is a big one. And that fault lies with the unions who thought the soccer model was the way to go. Massively imbalanced financial structures have fucked the global game. The onfield product has reached the inevitable conclusion of professionalism, and that is "defense wins championships". Every single football code i follow has the same problem. Rugby is going to be hard to unravel because its so frikken complex.
so, lets have a rant and solutions thread. What's wrong with the code, and how do we fix it?
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oh, and the concussion stuff worries me greatly. I hope it gets tossed unless guys were being actively pushed back on the field against medical advice.
otherwise, come on lads, you are going to fuck it for everyone in a chase for dollars.
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Making defending teams be clearly and obviously onside at rucks and mauls would be a good place to start.
Use technology to create a real time offside line that the TMO monitors and polices.Nothing will change until all national unions stop thinking purely about themselves and actually put their heads together and come up with a global season which is in the best interests of the game.
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my most obvious one is ban the box kick. no kicking from teh base of the ruck at all. It will do away with shit loads of the aerial bombardment crap we have now, and fuck the ridiculous rucks we see. and the halfbacks being able to move the ball around with impunity.
scrum infringements are a free kick only.
the one i really want will be fiercely fought by all players unions. re-introduce fatigue. benches are still 8 players, but you only have four subs. And if you use four and a prop goes down? play with 14. being able to sub half the team is ridiculous.
I wouldn't be averse to someone coming up with a rule that makes it important for your wingers and fullbacks to have to be back on defense. I'm coming around to the 50/20 rule to be honest.
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@mariner4life said in State of the Game:
my most obvious one is ban the box kick. no kicking from teh base of the ruck at all. It will do away with shit loads of the aerial bombardment crap we have now, and fuck the ridiculous rucks we see. and the halfbacks being able to move the ball around with impunity.
scrum infringements are a free kick only.
the one i really want will be fiercely fought by all players unions. re-introduce fatigue. benches are still 8 players, but you only have four subs. And if you use four and a prop goes down? play with 14. being able to sub half the team is ridiculous.
I wouldn't be averse to someone coming up with a rule that makes it important for your wingers and fullbacks to have to be back on defense. I'm coming around to the 50/20 rule to be honest.
All of this apart from the Scrum infringement thing. That will only lead to more scrums as the dominating team will just keep smoking them
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@Hooroo said in State of the Game:
@mariner4life said in State of the Game:
my most obvious one is ban the box kick. no kicking from teh base of the ruck at all. It will do away with shit loads of the aerial bombardment crap we have now, and fuck the ridiculous rucks we see. and the halfbacks being able to move the ball around with impunity.
scrum infringements are a free kick only.
the one i really want will be fiercely fought by all players unions. re-introduce fatigue. benches are still 8 players, but you only have four subs. And if you use four and a prop goes down? play with 14. being able to sub half the team is ridiculous.
I wouldn't be averse to someone coming up with a rule that makes it important for your wingers and fullbacks to have to be back on defense. I'm coming around to the 50/20 rule to be honest.
All of this apart from the Scrum infringement thing. That will only lead to more scrums as the dominating team will just keep smoking them
i don't understand. why would they be more incentivised than now?
no repeat scrums. you get one shot at it.
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@mariner4life said in State of the Game:
What's wrong with the code, and how do we fix it?
The problem is rucking. Or the lack of it. To appease soccer mums who wouldn't let Kamryn play anyway, we removed the ability to punish the poor soul who went to ground with the ball and held on to it. Watching old games it's apparent how few rucks there were in comparison to the modern game where people cart it up, bodies fly in like missiles to clear the one off his feet trying to win a penalty. It's relentlessly repetitive and boring, let alone dangerous.
Make players have to drive past the ball before it can be won. Ban kicks from the base of the ruck - it's a shit skill anyway.
Problem solved.
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@mariner4life said in State of the Game:
my most obvious one is ban the box kick. no kicking from teh base of the ruck at all. It will do away with shit loads of the aerial bombardment crap we have now, and fuck the ridiculous rucks we see. and the halfbacks being able to move the ball around with impunity.
Easy fix: eliminate caterpillar rucks via modified application of "use it". Once a ruck forms, ref calls "use it" and counts to 5 - not "waits for the ball to be available then counts to 5". Ball not out? Short arm against.
That way you can still box kick but you put yourself at risk of chargedown.
Scrum: can only opt for a scrum from a full-arm penalty. This is to counterbalance the increased short arms from the ruck change above.
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i am wrestling with the thought of banning hands in the ruck at all. Counter balanced by being really harsh on body heights over the ball. Incentivise throwing numbers at rucks on both sides of the ball
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@mariner4life Didn't they try something similar in the 2016 NPC and it was an utter failure?
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@mariner4life said in State of the Game:
i am wrestling with the thought of banning hands in the ruck at all. Counter balanced by being really harsh on body heights over the ball. Incentivise throwing numbers at rucks on both sides of the ball
When the Mazda ARC (2007 version) allowed hands in the ruck no matter what, it actually improved the game and stopped the missile cleanouts. It made teams commit more to the ruck as well, making space.
David Croft had a field day annoying people
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@NTA said in State of the Game:
David Croft had a field day annoying people
i cleaned out that guy with everything i had one day, and with a subtle shift of his body i slipped completely off. Immovable over the ball.
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@NTA said in State of the Game:
Scrum: can only opt for a scrum from a full-arm penalty. This is to counterbalance the increased short arms from the ruck change above.
I'd suggest that's completely the wrong approach. You want to incentivize maintaining power athletes in those positions. The more scrums they do, the tireder they become so less effective in defence.
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@NTA said in State of the Game:
@mariner4life said in State of the Game:
i am wrestling with the thought of banning hands in the ruck at all. Counter balanced by being really harsh on body heights over the ball. Incentivise throwing numbers at rucks on both sides of the ball
When the Mazda ARC (2007 version) allowed hands in the ruck no matter what, it actually improved the game and stopped the missile cleanouts. It made teams commit more to the ruck as well, making space.
David Croft had a field day annoying people
ok if my suggestion has been tried and failed as per @KiwiMurph then try something else. anything that commits defenders to the ruck is what is needed. The argies ignoring them and fanning across the field is good for no one.
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as with anything though, the coaches will beat any rule changes. coaches hate chaos and will do anything to avoid it. and so you get where we are today. over-coached, over-fit athletes playing a repetitive game punctuated by set pieces designed to do not much in most cases. -
@antipodean said in State of the Game:
@NTA said in State of the Game:
Scrum: can only opt for a scrum from a full-arm penalty. This is to counterbalance the increased short arms from the ruck change above.
I'd suggest that's completely the wrong approach. You want to incentivize maintaining power athletes in those positions. The more scrums they do, the tireder they become so less effective in defence.
fair point. i just hate constant resets and playing for penalties so you can kick goals.
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@mariner4life said in State of the Game:
@NTA said in State of the Game:
@mariner4life said in State of the Game:
i am wrestling with the thought of banning hands in the ruck at all. Counter balanced by being really harsh on body heights over the ball. Incentivise throwing numbers at rucks on both sides of the ball
When the Mazda ARC (2007 version) allowed hands in the ruck no matter what, it actually improved the game and stopped the missile cleanouts. It made teams commit more to the ruck as well, making space.
David Croft had a field day annoying people
ok if my suggestion has been tried and failed as per @KiwiMurph then try something else. anything that commits defenders to the ruck is what is needed. The argies ignoring them and fanning across the field is good for no one.
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as with anything though, the coaches will beat any rule changes. coaches hate chaos and will do anything to avoid it. and so you get where we are today. over-coached, over-fit athletes playing a repetitive game punctuated by set pieces designed to do not much in most cases.I don't now if it was a failure.
It was a coaching and commentating failure. People lost their shit about defenders toe poking the 'opponent's' balls out of the ruck, The obvious answer to this problem was to commit more players to protect the ball. Almost all the law experimentations have been either to speed the game up or to find away to make teams again commit more forwards to breakdowns.
Instead they reverted their interpretations to the status quo, but, as they reversed out of the barn door - they added yet another line to the rule book that you could only ruck backwards. Sometimes I just despair of it all ....
I don't know if it worked or not (or would work), it was still a work in progress ... but the administrative (lawmaking) outcome from it was , as I said, despairing.
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@KiwiMurph nah I cant recall what the changes were, but I think you could still use hands, but they were a mess with people wading through kicking it out
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I don't have a problem with box kicks.
Anyway. I grew up watching 80s rugby where the first-five spent 60 minutes putting up up-and-unders before you had earned the right to go wide.
Aerial ping-pong is bad. But seems waaaaay less of this than in the 90s (Can't remember why so much in 90s, maybe after lifting in lineouts legalised )
