Rugby used to be a simple game?

I was standing on the Terrace watching the Ulster/Dragons at Ravenhill in front of two guys of pensionable age and languid demeanour. Towards the end of game one asked the other wistfully, “didn’t rugby used to be a simple game?” His companion laughed sardonically by reply. The question struck a chord in my mind as to the route down which rugby union appears to be marching inexorably.

I recalled some 6 or 7 years ago when the IRB announced they intended to crack down on the crooked put-in to the scrum, amongst other laws being ignored by erstwhile professional players. At the time this was greeted with considerable ‘hallelujah’ by Stephen Jones, the Sunday Times rugby correspondent and long time critic of the bad habits proliferating rugby. Sadly, after some whistle blowing and penalty awards by the referees this desire to ‘straighten’ out the game faded into insignificance as scrum halves continued to bend the law in the apparent knowledge refs would get fed up blowing them up for the offence. Indeed that is what happened.

In the middle of last season (I think it was?), on a cold winter’s night at Ravenhill, I recalled a performance of considerable indecision by Scottish referee Malcom Changleng. From his body language it was clear Malcom had lost his refereeing bottle. As each ruck broke up his hand lingered whilst he debated in his mind where and to whom he should award or penalise. Although maligned by many supporters, Malcom was always eager to please and was ambitious to achieve the highest status possible as an international referee. He was mindful to criticism of his performance and willing to discuss it by all accounts. Sadly for family reasons,his departure from top class refereeing was announced by the SRU and both Malcom and his brother David disappeared of the top class refereeing radar.

How Malcom might have faired in the midst of the current refereeing shambles one can only imagine. Perhaps he’s grateful he got out at the right time. Watching one of his fellow countrymen referee at Ravenhill on Friday night reminded me how much of a shambles the current rugby laws are becoming and how the referees caught in the middle are rapidly becoming the bogey men of the game. I was bamboozled by Mr. McPherson’s performance on Friday night, but that has only been an accumulation of my boozlement. As the season has progressed through watching Tri Nations/NPC/Super 14/Currie Cup/GP and of course Magners League there is confusion and inconsistency in the application of the laws. Mr McPherson was only bottom end of that pernicious barrel.

No major sport that I can think of has had so many tinkering and law/rule changes as rugby over the last ten years. The current shambles is merely an accumulation of a long standing desire by the southern Hemisphere rugby elite and Australia in particular to make the game more ‘appealing’ to spectators. One presumes, Aussie rugby union spectators face the multiple attractions of Aussie Rugby League and Aussie rules football. The pursuit of the so called ‘attractive’ rugby has led to the steady erosion of the basic cornerstones around which rugby union is built, namely the set piece lineout and scrum.

The current elv’s merely accelerate the prevailing winds towards what is suspiciously looking like another version of rugby league. There is the attempt to erode the number of lineouts in a game by barring a direct kick to touch from a team defending it’s own 22. Note, rugby league has no lineout at all. The defending team now stands back 5 metres from the scrum. In rugby league they stand 10 metres from the opposition.

Finally there is the scrum. Rugby league has one, but it is in name and appearance only, for it does not operate as a scrum as we know it in union. Whilst the scrum in union functions, it is reduced to being a device for protecting the ball rather than trying to win it. The lack of a straight put in, means it is no longer a competition to win the ball it once was.

Of course the Aussies have been in the forefront in trying to reduce the power of the scrum. The reason apparently, is Aussie mums and dads don’t want their kids mangled. Strange that they endorse current new laws which advocate collapsing a maul by using your body to pull a heap of other bodies on top of you and risk getting mangled. Barring kicking direct to touch has spawned a whole new aerial bombardment where players leap to win the ball with ensuing aerial collisions engendering further risk of injury.

Perhaps the aerial collisions remind the Aussies of Aussie rules? It seems the Southern Hemisphere spectator can no longer be relied upon to dwell on the slow burn that characterises traditional rugby union. Were the teams probe each other for strengths and weaknesses and the game builds over 80 minutes, yielding a struggle for supremacy that is not always an in your face experience. Instead a frantic game of pass the ball and kick it to hell at a whirlwind rate of knots would appear to be the order of the SH game this season to help satiate the spectators desire for entertainment. That the game lurches towards a bastardized version of rugby league and will be seen as pale comparison to Aussie rugby League doesn’t seem to matter to IRB chiefs.

Instead the Southern Hemisphere with the help of a few coaches lambast the lack of appreciation for the new laws from a burgeoning rugby union game in the Northern Hemisphere. Todays Independent has an interview with Graham Henry The All Blacks coach says it’s alright for the Northern Hemisphere with their large crowds and good spectator base but hey, we down under have to play a good game in the right style because we don’t have that population base. This is the sort of twisted logic that is driving elvs and ignores the rich tradition of the game in its traditional form as played in those parts. The game is increasing in popularity in the NH because of the style of play and good game – without elvs.

Interestingly even with the pell mell of Henry’s so called good game and style, the spectators are simply not turning up in their droves to embrace this new concept nor is the Tri Nations quite the competition Henry is making it out to be. He reckons its better than the 6N though I doubt TV viewing figures, or the money it generates would support his comments when compared to the 6N.

The understanding required for the game is going from Tintin to the Beano, such has been the erosion of its multi faceted technicalities and complex variances within this mentally taxing and athletic discipline. Sure it used to be simple but in a complex way that is steadily going out of the game to be replaced by laws that are open to interpretation, are the subject of subjective calls by referees and undermined by misguided directives allegedly designed to make the game enjoyable for you and me the spectator.

The dumbing down of rugby is perhaps a metaphor for the times in which we live. We live in an age where mental arithmetic is replaced by the less taxing calculator, were English is abbreviated in text and adjusted on a computer spell checker and were culture is seen in some quarters as the preserve of mac wearers. It’s an age were the lowest common dominator of intelligence must be catered through filtering out and dumbing down of rugby’s complex and fundamental nuances and technicalities. For sure rugby is surely just another casualty of the times. Up to three generations of rugby followers, grounded in the games basic concepts could be lost if the elvs grip the game in a flurry of watered down laws designed to appeal to a designer generation.

The summer of love quickly segued into the winter of discontent, we must beware of quick fix adrenalin rush administration to trends and fads.

Yes rugby used to be a simple game,that is now bnefuddled by muddled thinking which has turned it into a cold house for those of us who still try to understand how the game is being played and don’t merely turn up to watch a few mid air collisions and razzmatazz air ball.

O’Neill of the Australian Rugby Union certainly epitomises this dumb approach. He has all the intellectual gravitas and attention span of an amoeba and I’m conscious I could be putting amoebas in an unfavourable light here. You’ll know what I mean when this man opens his mouth and a whole lotta Aussie portends to speak for the game from his fifedom of little Australia. The world must really seem a small place to him. Perhaps it stretches all the way to his home to office and back. Here he goes:

Australian Rugby Union chief executive John O’Neill said recently: “Up until 1 August next year, SANZAR competitions can continue to use the sanctions. And we would be mad not to. If we didn’t, we would be putting up the white flag.”

No worries John, hey the white flag to what exactly? Well actually the fact that no one outside of the Aussies and the Kiwis, (quite a few unions by the way) want the sanction rule but that matters little to O’Neill

The IRB and O’Neill have a lot to answer for. The key question is who do they answer to?

NB: Shaun Edwards writes in this morning’s Guardian about the diverse effect the current law changes have had on the GP and Wasps in particular. He would appear to concur with some of my comments in respect of the refereeing conundrum created by elvs. Interestingly Wasps, like Ulster have just lost their first 3 competitive games of the season.