The Current State of Rugby

[antipodean]

@gibbon-rib That's disgraceful. We may as well let halfbacks throw the ball forward and play NFL.

[Dan54]

@Winger said in The Current State of Rugby:

@Dan54

but its different now. For one every big game is on TV. Professional rugby has meant needing a diff set of rules and has changed the game. More sport options in nz. Internet means we can all watch our fill of rugby

Add in boring super rugby with one team always winning and poor decisions like expansion .

I agree with the game being on tv is what is changing it ,or really the nomey is, but I not convinced it for the better. I don't think one team winning super rugby is what makes it boring, that is only probably for non Crusaders supporters (rugby wasn't boring when Auckland kept winning in 80s, , what is stuffing it up is what is supporting it---money! I know the big thing is that many people get their sport fix on tv etc, and don't go to sports, but it's making the game less atractive. Watch club games etc especially in smaller places the game is still great to watch, and is played and watched for the love of the game! Hell I just finished watching a college game on tv, no TMO or anything, just good rugby to watch.
I say if we starting to get rusted old buggers like me struggling, I think it is getting to be problem

[canefan]

@gibbon-rib said in The Current State of Rugby:

@antipodean said in The Current State of Rugby:

I'm convinced the simple solution to everything is to have the ball in play more. Don't stop because someone wants to tie up a shoelace or put in a contact lens. Don't get to the lineout quickly enough? Short arm penalty. Fuck around at scrum time, short arm penalty. Water is for half time.

Someone on Gwlad took a stopwatch to the first half of the Wales-Boks test. The half lasted 48:30. The ball was in play 15:30.

There's no doubt the game is far more stop start than league now. At a time when the NRL is actually trying to speed the game up. I love rugby, but for a neutral or uneducated observer league has a superior product right now. There is just far too much time taken up by shit other than actually playing rugby

[Kiwiwomble]

@Dan54 said in The Current State of Rugby:

@Winger said in The Current State of Rugby:

@Dan54

but its different now. For one every big game is on TV. Professional rugby has meant needing a diff set of rules and has changed the game. More sport options in nz. Internet means we can all watch our fill of rugby

Add in boring super rugby with one team always winning and poor decisions like expansion .

I agree with the game being on tv is what is changing it ,or really the nomey is, but I not convinced it for the better. I don't think one team winning super rugby is what makes it boring, that is only probably for non Crusaders supporters (rugby wasn't boring when Auckland kept winning in 80s, , what is stuffing it up is what is supporting it---money! I know the big thing is that many people get their sport fix on tv etc, and don't go to sports, but it's making the game less atractive. Watch club games etc especially in smaller places the game is still great to watch, and is played and watched for the love of the game! Hell I just finished watching a college game on tv, no TMO or anything, just good rugby to watch.

one small comment, thats because that is one decade...we're now in our 3rd decade of the Crusaders winning, even during their dark days of blackadder they generally made finals

add to that auckland in the NPC was one of 10's of unions, so other teams had little rivalries with the teams "around them"...we've distilled top level rugby down to these five teams so the dominance is more complete

@canefan said in The Current State of Rugby:

@gibbon-rib said in The Current State of Rugby:

@antipodean said in The Current State of Rugby:

I'm convinced the simple solution to everything is to have the ball in play more. Don't stop because someone wants to tie up a shoelace or put in a contact lens. Don't get to the lineout quickly enough? Short arm penalty. Fuck around at scrum time, short arm penalty. Water is for half time.

Someone on Gwlad took a stopwatch to the first half of the Wales-Boks test. The half lasted 48:30. The ball was in play 15:30.

There's no doubt the game is far more stop start than league now. At a time when the NRL is actually trying to speed the game up. I love rugby, but for a neutral or uneducated observer league has a superior product right now. There is just far too much time taken up by shit other than actually playing rugby

speed....thats actually where i think we go wrong...slow and continuous is fine, it doesn't need to be end to end stuff, focusing on speed is giving in to the idea there are lots of breaks, IMO, we had a long break so we need to jam all the rugby we missed into the next 30 sec! hurry!

[canefan]

@Kiwiwomble said in The Current State of Rugby:

@Dan54 said in The Current State of Rugby:

@Winger said in The Current State of Rugby:

@Dan54

but its different now. For one every big game is on TV. Professional rugby has meant needing a diff set of rules and has changed the game. More sport options in nz. Internet means we can all watch our fill of rugby

Add in boring super rugby with one team always winning and poor decisions like expansion .

I agree with the game being on tv is what is changing it ,or really the nomey is, but I not convinced it for the better. I don't think one team winning super rugby is what makes it boring, that is only probably for non Crusaders supporters (rugby wasn't boring when Auckland kept winning in 80s, , what is stuffing it up is what is supporting it---money! I know the big thing is that many people get their sport fix on tv etc, and don't go to sports, but it's making the game less atractive. Watch club games etc especially in smaller places the game is still great to watch, and is played and watched for the love of the game! Hell I just finished watching a college game on tv, no TMO or anything, just good rugby to watch.

one small comment, thats because that is one decade...we're now in our 3rd decade of the Crusaders winning, even during their dark days of blackadder they generally made finals

add to that auckland in the NPC was one of 10's of unions, so other teams had little rivalries with the teams "around them"...we've distilled top level rugby down to these five teams so the dominance is more complete

@canefan said in The Current State of Rugby:

@gibbon-rib said in The Current State of Rugby:

@antipodean said in The Current State of Rugby:

I'm convinced the simple solution to everything is to have the ball in play more. Don't stop because someone wants to tie up a shoelace or put in a contact lens. Don't get to the lineout quickly enough? Short arm penalty. Fuck around at scrum time, short arm penalty. Water is for half time.

Someone on Gwlad took a stopwatch to the first half of the Wales-Boks test. The half lasted 48:30. The ball was in play 15:30.

There's no doubt the game is far more stop start than league now. At a time when the NRL is actually trying to speed the game up. I love rugby, but for a neutral or uneducated observer league has a superior product right now. There is just far too much time taken up by shit other than actually playing rugby

speed....thats actually where i think we go wrong...slow and continuous is fine, it doesn't need to be end to end stuff, focusing on speed is giving in to the idea there are lots of breaks, IMO, we had a long break so we need to jam all the rugby we missed into the next 30 sec! hurry!

Pace of play, as in how many stoppages are there. Right now a shitload!

[KiwiMurph]

@canefan 100%. Players going down 'injured' at scrum/lineout time. Scrum resets. Endless TMO replays etc etc.

[muddyriver]

The new rule in NPC will be interesting around water breaks, they are limited to one per half.

cutting the amount of props lying on the ground getting a rest is a great idea,

I would go as far as completely eliminating the TMO apart from try scoring actions one phase max. TMO is a huge blight on the game atm and makes everything look bad in slowmo.

[Kiwiwomble]

@muddyriver literally should check grounding, the ref and AR's should be in a position to see everything else, anything they missed gets picked up after the game

[canefan]

@muddyriver said in The Current State of Rugby:

The new rule in NPC will be interesting around water breaks, they are limited to one per half.

cutting the amount of props lying on the ground getting a rest is a great idea,

I would go as far as completely eliminating the TMO apart from try scoring actions one phase max. TMO is a huge blight on the game atm and makes everything look bad in slowmo.

I think the idea that anyone who stays down has to leave the field until at least the next stoppage is a good idea. Or maybe they have to leave for a certain time to allow for a medical check. This would stop the fakers. Unfortunately with TMO, now it is out of the box it is hard to put it back. And in rugby, like many other fast contact sports, context seems to be something no one considers but definitely should

[junior]

@Crazy-Horse said in The Current State of Rugby:

@Kiwiwomble said in The Current State of Rugby:

@dogmeat i feel the real rugby nerds enjoy seeing every mistake from player or ref picked up and punished/corrected....where as the casual fan or those of us that forget about most mistake pretty quickly (unless i read about them on here) enjoy rugby much less

I think people want to see the other team punished. If their team benefits from cards and penalties they often don't give a shit and can be quite supportive of the sanctions. This seems to be the case in all the Rugby I watch (Super and ABs).

This attitude seems to have flowed onto the pitch as well. One thing I have noticed in both tests is the Irish in amongst their talking to the ref seem to be angling very hard for an AB player to leave the field whenever there's an "incident" or a series of penalties in a row. I get that playing a man up is a real advantage, but there's something a bit off in my view to have what appears to be a strategy to pressure the ref to give you that advantage whenever possible.

[Rancid Schnitzel]

@canefan said in The Current State of Rugby:

@gibbon-rib said in The Current State of Rugby:

@antipodean said in The Current State of Rugby:

I'm convinced the simple solution to everything is to have the ball in play more. Don't stop because someone wants to tie up a shoelace or put in a contact lens. Don't get to the lineout quickly enough? Short arm penalty. Fuck around at scrum time, short arm penalty. Water is for half time.

Someone on Gwlad took a stopwatch to the first half of the Wales-Boks test. The half lasted 48:30. The ball was in play 15:30.

There's no doubt the game is far more stop start than league now. At a time when the NRL is actually trying to speed the game up. I love rugby, but for a neutral or uneducated observer league has a superior product right now. There is just far too much time taken up by shit other than actually playing rugby

I think League has gone to the opposite extreme and is maybe letting too much stuff go. There wouldn't be a player left on the field with the ridiculous level of union scrutiny.

[ACT Crusader]

@bayimports I agree. I look at league and why we don’t see more intercept attempts when there are less players on the field? Part of it is attacking/defensive pattens, but I think ultimately it is about it being such a low percentage play that possession is up for grabs. And in league, possession is king.

It used to be in rugby but the common trend in todays game (and for the last number of years) less possession does not matter.

I like a harsher sanction than just a scrum for a knock on, but specific circumstances must dictate whether a card is warranted rather than a more blanket YC approach that has crept in. Much like a negative play at the breakdown is a penalty unless the specific circumstance warrants a card.

[canefan]

@junior said in The Current State of Rugby:

@Crazy-Horse said in The Current State of Rugby:

@Kiwiwomble said in The Current State of Rugby:

@dogmeat i feel the real rugby nerds enjoy seeing every mistake from player or ref picked up and punished/corrected....where as the casual fan or those of us that forget about most mistake pretty quickly (unless i read about them on here) enjoy rugby much less

I think people want to see the other team punished. If their team benefits from cards and penalties they often don't give a shit and can be quite supportive of the sanctions. This seems to be the case in all the Rugby I watch (Super and ABs).

This attitude seems to have flowed onto the pitch as well. One thing I have noticed in both tests is the Irish in amongst their talking to the ref seem to be angling very hard for an AB player to leave the field whenever there's an "incident" or a series of penalties in a row. I get that playing a man up is a real advantage, but there's something a bit off in my view to have what appears to be a strategy to pressure the ref to give you that advantage whenever possible.

It's the thing I hate most about football. The way the players stand around and pressure the ref. That and simulation

[junior]

@Crucial said in The Current State of Rugby:

@Rancid-Schnitzel said in The Current State of Rugby:

Just on the initial post I couldn't agree more. I was someone who went to sometimes extreme lengths to watch or even get rugby results when living overseas. Fark I remember the stress of waiting for the live update to refresh. I used to stress about getting home on time to watch Super games on Friday night. I didnt want to miss a game. Every AB loss was like a knife to the heart.

Now I'm starting to not even give a shit. A game that is by its very nature dangerous has been sanitised within an inch of its life. It's almost as stop-start as NFL ffs. The game has been destroyed as a spectacle. Just think, they've had to change red card rules because there are so fůcking many of them now.

They say they play rugby in heaven, well I hope to fůck it isn't this version.

It does make you wonder if the 'old game' is fit for purpose with bigger, faster players.
Watching a game of decent club rugby or an age group/women's game is much more enjoyable and simple.
You could either change the pro laws to suit the players or, as suggested, change some of the laws around subs to pull the pro game back toward 'normality'.
It's the hemisphere difference that puzzles me. Is it a parochial thing? How is it that 'their' game doesn't see the same problems? It's not as if accidents don't happen when you cross an equator. The NH game isn't a 10 man one any more either so the loss of players from the field has a similar effect. Or is it media driven? There was an Irish Times article the other day that made the ABs out to be vicious thugs out to cripple people.

Maybe the issue is how people in each hemisphere see the game and what they think it should be.

Speaking in gross generalisations, sports in the NH tends to be more tribal, based more on tradition, and more of a "village against village / town against town" game. In that sense, it's less about entertainment and more about tribal pride. I think that, in the NH, a large part of the entertainment comes from the "drama" of what happens on and off the field. All of the things we are complaining about create drama.

We obviously have some of the above in the SH, but it has been massively diluted in recent times. It seems to me that, in the SH, we derive more of our enjoyment and entertainment from the sport from the skills on display. Hence, cards and all that we complain about here are things that detract from that.

You can see these different attitudes play out in how we talk about matches here - we will all spend way too much time talking about "how" the ABs have played even after a win. Imagine if we beat Ireland 23-12 despite playing most of the match a man up like in Dunedin - we'd all be having massive pile on about how poorly the team played despite having that advantage.

[gibbon rib]

I think @junior is right, that is a big part of it. In the UK if you were to say that "new rules are being introduced to make the game more entertaining / attractive" this would almost universally be understood to be a criticism rather than a compliment. It's not as though people there are opposed to entertaining or attractive sport, but there is a level of cynicism that is generally not matched here in the SH (it would be assumed that such changes are probably against the spirit and traditions of the game and aimed at armchair viewers who don't understand the sport).

[antipodean]

Good points @junior and @gibbon-rib - it's only recently home nations rugby could be considered entertaining. They're not used to it.

[gibbon rib]

A few other factors:

The influence of league. Particularly in Australia, but also NZ. This is most notable in the discussion around head contact, but also elsewhere. (Obviously league is big in England too, but generally there is a firewall between the two codes. In Australia many people follow both flavours of Rugby; in England, it's either one or the other).

This might be a contentious one, but I also think ignorance of the laws is part of the problem too. I'm thinking of Australia here, since most of the rugby media I see is Australian, but I get the impression that SA is similar. Kiwis on the other hand seem to know their stuff and be a bit more measured. (Obviously I'm generalising massively here, and I might lose Aussie friends, but hey ho...). Lots of Aussies are part time fans, rugby is maybe their 3rd or 4th or 6th favourite sport, so they're understandably not as familiar with the rules. The real problem is that the level of rugby commentary and journalism here is hopeless. Every time some decision goes against the Wallabies, the commentators pretend to be dumbfounded and outraged and shocked at the absurdity of it. Then at half time, the presenters are equally astonished and talk about how ridiculous it is. Then the next day, the newspapers run stories about the dumbest rule in rugby, and how the administrators and refs are killing the game. And the average fan who doesn't really know the laws comes away thinking rugby is a mess. I thought this might get better after we ditched Fox, but it seems 9/Stan have decided to plough the same furrow.

[gibbon rib]

@antipodean said in The Current State of Rugby:

Good points @junior and @gibbon-rib - it's only recently home nations rugby could be considered entertaining. They're not used to it.

If God had wanted us to throw it around he wouldn't have made it rain 350 days a year. Just give it to the fat lad to stick up his jumper like nature intended.

[MajorPom]

@gibbon-rib said in The Current State of Rugby:

A few other factors:

The influence of league. Particularly in Australia, but also NZ. This is most notable in the discussion around head contact, but also elsewhere. (Obviously league is big in England too, but generally there is a firewall between the two codes. In Australia many people follow both flavours of Rugby; in England, it's either one or the other).

This might be a contentious one, but I also think ignorance of the laws is part of the problem too. I'm thinking of Australia here, since most of the rugby media I see is Australian, but I get the impression that SA is similar. Kiwis on the other hand seem to know their stuff and be a bit more measured. (Obviously I'm generalising massively here, and I might lose Aussie friends, but hey ho...). Lots of Aussies are part time fans, rugby is maybe their 3rd or 4th or 6th favourite sport, so they're understandably not as familiar with the rules. The real problem is that the level of rugby commentary and journalism here is hopeless. Every time some decision goes against the Wallabies, the commentators pretend to be dumbfounded and outraged and shocked at the absurdity of it. Then at half time, the presenters are equally astonished and talk about how ridiculous it is. Then the next day, the newspapers run stories about the dumbest rule in rugby, and how the administrators and refs are killing the game. And the average fan who doesn't really know the laws comes away thinking rugby is a mess. I thought this might get better after we ditched Fox, but it seems 9/Stan have decided to plough the same furrow.

Pretty much so summed up @NTA career on TSF there ..

[Victor Meldrew]

Interesting take by Nigel Owens.

https://www.ruck.co.uk/the-games-out-of-control-nigel-owens-wants-five-law-changes-asap/