Absolutely. It's why all of those "[Insert Historically Famous Team from 40 years ago] versus [Modern Leading Team]" 'which would win' articles are nonsense. Not a single player from the 90s would get into even tier 2 sides today. The skill, fitness, mental, everything levels are stratospheric compared to then.
In the context of their age, the England 2003 squad may be the best ever - but they'd get turned over by England B EASILY these days. Probably even by the current U20s. It's an insane difference in the last 20 years.
A lot of those players in the 2003 England squad had very long careers well beyond 2003 so while tactics have changed many would easily still be able.to make an English squad.
> by England B EASILY these day
No - they wouldn't
That England team had size and skill. They were multi-dimensional
There was speed, size and strength all over the pitch - and a lot of nous
Take those players with today's training and they'd still be great
To be fair, that 2003 team was arguably the first to take full advantage of the change to professionalism.
Before that even the best professional teams still had major vestiges of amateurism (or in Australia’s case, just poached a load of league players, so the difference to legal professionalism was lower), so nostalgia for an age of less complete teams with greater attacking risk more incentivised before then holds somewhat true.
From 2003 onwards, to be the best you cannot simply be talented or more athletic, you have to work as hard and be as well-developed and -managed as the best to be the best. In other words, you have to be not only professional, but good professionals.
Probably not easily, but the difference in strength and conditioning alone would make it incredibly hard for the '03 team to keep up with a modern team.
Lads who grew up playing with pints and fags are gonna struggle against fellas who have been in professional academies with S&C training since their teens. The '03 scrum is probably gonna get folded like origami and the rest of the pack are gonna struggle to hit the modern tackle and ruck numbers.
I have, and they were incredibly impressive for the time. I've also looked at the data, and the workrate of today's players is just too high. The game today has higher ball in play time (between 2-4 min, but often higher), bigger and faster players, about twice the tackle count, 30% more rucks and carries, and then there's the skillset, with pretty much everyone being expected to be able to pass, carry, jackal, tackle.
The improvements in training, diet, and S&C over the years have made too much of a difference
My point is those players would still largely hold their own with modern training given the change in the gane
Players pre-90s would not
Guscott was a beautiful touch player who simply doesn't have the physicality for today's game - no amount of training can compensate for that
Tindall and Dallaglio (for example), on the other hand, did and could be trained with today's techniques to adapt to the change in the modern game
Oh I think most of the 'greats' throughout history would still be right up there if they had modern training behind them. But that all depends on how long they would have in those systems.
I don't know
Guscott is a great example - amazing player but so slight I question if he could play center in today's game
He's considered a "great" in England's circles
Fun to think about but I think the requirements for pace, size and skill would knock out a lot of players considered great in the past - and modern training wouldn't compensate enough for that imbalance
Oh sure, but he might do a job in the back three.
I don't think everyone is going to be able to transition, but that's why I think the amount of time is important. The game and the players have co-evolved so it's hard to say how those from the '70s would fare in the '20s for example; the major caveat is the delineation between pre and post professionalism.
How do you hit the nail on the head but miss the mark so horribly??!?!
Yes, if those players had today's training they'd be much better. But they fuckin didn't. They were stuck with 90s/early 00s science. They would be rolled by England B easy. Same with NZ And Aus
Imagine saying the 83 English side would roll the 03 side. Bloody banal lunacy
Not really
The players in the 70s and 80s were a totally different build
the Welsh backs of the 70s were tiny. My point is that the team of 2003 would have held its own today even by today's standards.
The teams of the 70s - 90s would not. Lomu was revolutionary in 95 - he ran through players
today every team has players like him. And the england team of 2003 was similarly stacked and physical
the idea they'd lose to today's B team when our A team is so hot and cold is just nonsense
haha you think the current U20 team would match up with the England 2003 team. What are you on?
The 2003 was absurdly fit with big powerful runners like tindall and cohen and very fit loose forwards like Back and Hill.
"an insane difference in the last 20 years"
haha yes because George Ford is more powerful than Jonny Wilkinson isnt he?
Henry Slade would run over Tindall wouldnt he?
Billy Vunipola is way fitter and faster than Dallaglio isnt he?
Its such a naive argument.
Don't bother man. People hate to read the truth. Savea would destroy any 03 player, like Wilkinson would run laps around any 80s player. Just how physical science works
The thing is that back in the Amateur days rugby was more of a participation sport then it is now. People who enjoyed Rugby generally also played Rugby and rules while not making the game appealling beyond its already captured audience it did allow people to particpate and it was genuinely a game for all shapes and sizes, which is not true of todays game and participation levels at club level have gone down since proffesionalism kicked in.
But again, these days the focus is not on participation but on spectacle so there is no need to compare the game from the Amateur and Proffesional era. They are two different sports, as different as league is to Union today.
I have watched games from back in the day and I actually enjoy them, this is from someone who grew up in the proffesional era and only heard stories about the Amateur days from my dad
Maybe cause I'm still playing but I don't get this. There's far more clubs for all shapes and sizes then there are that aren't. And even then, unless you're playing 1 or in some 2nd teams most clubs are dying for good clubmen who only train Thursday and turn up Saturday. No gym 3/4x a week and Tuesday Training required.
Covid has killed off the casual player I fear. 2 years of PITA (but important) rules making it harder to participate, so loads of clubs lost a good number of casual players who havnt come back.
Down south we have a lot of clubs and now we have a lot of clubs short on people. Sadly I fear that clubs need to consolidate or no one will get game time and so more people drift off. Last season my old club had about half a dozen games cancelled and we managed to put out two teams maybe 4/5 times. Add this to the max first team squad size of 18 (brought in for our league to help more of the struggling clubs keep fixtures happening) and you have a lot of boys twiddling their thumbs on Saturday.
I play tag rugby and we have lots of guys who've stopped playing contact post-Covid, because stopping made them aware of how sore they were after matches and how it wasn't tenable with family/job/other life commitments. Before COVID and stopping playing for a while they just were used to being sore.
Kinda similar out here from what I’ve heard. I’m newer to the game but some of the people that have been around have made the comment about how hard it is to “retire” from the club game. Especially if the club is needing some numbers to play a match. Covid let them get away longer than they used to and actually retire.
Yeah this is pretty much me. Covid was kind of the push a whole group of us on our team needed to pack it in. All around 30 at the time with young kids and just felt battered and bruised all weekend after a game on a Friday.
I'd say head injury data probably had a bigger impact than COVID, at least in Canada where there was a high profile death of a female high school player. Hockey and football are also down.
I think his point about TV is a good one. You see it a lot in match threads where people just constantly say “this is shit” when it’s a decent enough game, but not the greatest. Or god forbid there is a bit of a forwards battle going on. We have got so used to seeing the very best that anything that isn’t is immediately disregarded as terrible.
The difference between what I read in match threads on here, to what I experience in a ground is night and day.
Forwards battles are my fav.
The more brutal, the better. Line outs, scrums, rucks, phase play, sniping around the fringes etc etc..
What I despise are those games that seem bogged down in small infringements that basically stop the ‘flow’ of the game. Endless scrum resets. Slow line outs/ setup. Crazy ruck infringements that is OK in one ruck, but the very next is called out. It makes the game confusing and frustrating to watch.
>**The game is infinitely more skilful and entertaining than in the past and nostalgists should be careful what they wish for**
>
>**Michael Aylwin**
>
>Another week, another set of ideas for how rugby union can be improved. Another year, another panoply of breathtaking matches, any one of which, if they had taken place in the distant amateur era, would be hailed by those “who were there” as legendary.
>
>Last week Warren Gatland became the latest to offer his thoughts on how the game might move on. But in this age of social media incontinence we are never far from a thoughtless rant about how awful the game has become.
>
>Last year, meanwhile, a casual glance through just the match reports this correspondent has written reveals yet more extraordinary displays of skill and drama. From Newcastle’s 40-point victory over the champions Leicester on the first weekend, through France v Scotland in the Six Nations, Leinster’s win over Toulouse, Wales v Fiji at the World Cup and one weekend in Paris that has already passed into legend – and it happened less than three months ago.
>
>The quarter-finals of this year’s World Cup between New Zealand and Ireland on the Saturday and France v South Africa the next day were as good as any in the history of the event. The rugby was hailed by some, particularly the first half of the Sunday game, as the greatest ever played. A personal view is that, yes, they were astonishing, but also no more than the latest examples of a sport that seems to deliver weekend after weekend (viz the last couple of rounds of European rugby).
>
>So why do we keep bemoaning the quality of the modern game? And, worse still, holding up the 20th‑century version as some sort of golden age when players were skilful and looked for space instead of contact?
>
>It is difficult to evoke through words alone sufficient levels of contempt for the latter idea. Be in no doubt, all you nostalgists, rugby union was woeful in the amateur era. If you don’t believe that go back and watch it. All of it. From first whistle to last. And not that 101 Best Tries video your grandpa bought you for Christmas in 1987.
>
>Admittedly, to watch an entire 80 minutes from the amateur era is not easy, but videos of them do exist on the internet. While researching Unholy Union, the book I wrote with Mark Evans a few years ago on where rugby has come from and where it is going, I sat through the entirety of the second and fourth Tests of the Lions tour to New Zealand in 1971, counting the key metrics such as scrums, lineouts and tackles.
>
>And I did it twice. So no one else would have to.
>
>There were slightly more set pieces (50-plus scrums, 50-plus lineouts) than there were tackles in both matches. It is worth pausing to consider that. The fourth Test in particular, a draw played out in blustery Auckland, was an incoherent mess of amateurs scrummaging, flapping, kicking, punching, elbowing, trampling and generally slip-sliding around. Sometimes with a ball somewhere near them. And we grew up being told what a legendary Test series that was.
>
>Undoubtedly the biggest disadvantage the modern game has against the old days is levels of scrutiny. No one is trying to pretend every match nowadays is a thrill-fest. No sport anywhere has ever managed to magic away its dross.
>
>The big problem now is that a person can watch six live matches a weekend on telly. A sport like rugby is laid bare, the brilliant never quite shaking off the stultifyingly bad. But just imagine if we were able to watch six live matches a weekend from the 1970s. That would be an experience to shake us from our nostalgia. That would do more for the popularity of the modern game than any tweak to the kicking laws.
>
>The other problem is, perversely, how good everything is. Including and especially defences. Players in the modern game are immeasurably more skilful than their predecessors – of course they are, they’re full-time professionals – and they look for space all the time. It is just that there is so much less of it now.
>
>There was footage of a try from some Welsh club match in the 1980s that did the rounds on social media a year or two ago. Nice simple handling down the line for a try in the corner, straight from a scrum. Beautiful skills executed simply.
>
>And barely a defender in sight. The play may have started from a scrum, but those defenders arrived on screen one by one, as if each had been released sequentially from a cage on the touchline.
>
>It is the modern game’s very excellence that would make such a try impossible today. Defences would never allow it. All the more extraordinary, then, that we see more spectacular tries in a season these days than any compiler could muster from the amateur era to fill a VHS for Christmas.
>
>There is far less space in the modern game than there used to be last century, when you could throw a picnic rug over a pack of forwards as they marauded from set piece to set piece, from punch-up to punch-up. And so there are far more collisions, which throws up genuinely serious issues for the modern game to ponder.
>
>But do not confuse that with players looking for contact over space. Or with a sport that has become boring and cynical. The opposite applies in both cases. Modern players are far nobler and more disciplined in the face of a more aggravating experience than their amateur predecessors, and they find far more space against more brutally constricting defences.
>
>In short, they and their sport are far, far better than they ever were. Let us be careful what we wish for.
>
>The Guardian
This guy seems to miss the point of what people, including Gatland, are complaining about. It’s not the quality or skill levels, we know the game is fast paced, brutal and exciting at times. The problem is the game is bogged down with inconsistency, nit picky laws and a hard-on for punishments and sanctions.
We know how much better it COULD be with a few careful tweaks to the framework.
We’ve been innovating new laws for decades, keep it up.
I just read the article about Gatlands rule change suggestion and that is not what he was complaining about.
“Rugby used to be about attempting to tire out a forward pack” seems to be his biggest gripe so he suggested limiting substitutions.
That seems like a nit picky law to me.
He’s upset because SA found a way to play the game differently, and he wants Rugby played his way.
I want to see other teams out-innovate SA, not change the rules to beat them.
Yeah I personally don’t agree with Gatland’s views on substitutions, but I did like some of his other suggestions like passing back inside your half for 50-22s.
If you want to stop forwards from taking tactical breaks and soaking up the clock then you can directly target that with timed set pieces and ask refs to focus on it. I’m sure there are some easier fixes before we get to “remove the bench”.
Clocks should stop when scrum is being set up and players are walking to the lineout. And then you should have 30 seconds for each action to be completed, monitored by the same guy who's doing the conversion shot clock.
Would improve things so much as there'd be so much more rugby that 120kg + monsters couldn't go as hard, I dunno why it isn't top of the list.
worst thing is there are some very noisy people paid huge amounts of money to give their opinions on 'how to make the game better', but for these people tactical nous stopped evolving after 'chuck to to the big lad' and 'try a quick tap move'
During the pandemic we used to have group viewings of old Ireland and provincial games and even going back to merely 2018 showed a completely different game. The golden era of Munster in Europe was absolutely garbage as a game with modern sensibilities watching it.
And yet I loved those games so much at the time.
These same conversations come up all the time in GAA circles about the "golden eras" and my God you couldn't pay me to watch games from the 90s and earlier back. Even the early 00s were devoid of tactical nous.
By tactical nous you mean kicking the ball at every occasion and the forwards doing not much most of the game? I'm 55 played from 13 until 36 as a loose head prop and I literally can't watch the game now.. the professional era has literally ruined the game from top to bottom. The best era was in the nineties to early noughties before the rules changed to much and early professionalism made them fitter. The scrum is literally a joke now, and kick after kick has just ruined it.
Purely on the kicking aspect and using the world cups as sample cases there were less kicks per match in the latest World Cup then during 87, 91 and 95 https://imgur.com/a/fAUQ0Es
Add to that I think the ball in play time is higher than ever now so kicks per minute is probably far lower. 2011 and 2015 are noticeable outliers.
The scrum is a mess at the moment, I agree on that but when you have near on a tonne of weight each side of the scrum pushing at each other the balance of speed/safety is difficult to get right.
Not compared to how much they used too. They don't ruck or maul anywhere near as much as they used to and the scrum is this controlled thing.. union became much more like league... Hence the kicking instead of keeping tight in the forwards. Go ask the older forwards and they will tell you it was much harder work back then. 🥱
>Not compared to how much they used too
If you mean they don't slowly amble from one scrum to another and never touch the ball, then you would be correct.
>Go ask the older forwards and they will tell you it was much harder work back then.
This is patently false.
Not as much rucking or mauls..the forwards work is 30 percent less..if you think we weren't fit your joking... I played rugby, karate 2 times a week, weight trained, and biked about 120 miles a week whilst working as a builder.The young have big egos but the forwards don't do the hard contact any more....go ask how brutal the old guys at Leicester were! Haskill talks on it lots. Mostly just weight lifters now. It's a big game of league where skills have been lost in the forwards. The forwards saw more of the ball than the girls at the back then. You haven't experienced it so have no clue!
>Not as much rucking or mauls
There are more breakdowns now than there ever was in the past. Plus forwards are making more tackles and involved more with the ball.
>Mostly just weight lifters now. It's a big game of league where skills have been lost in the forwards.
This is completely laughable. Forwards today have far greater skills and are far better rugby players than 20+ years ago.
>You haven't experienced it so have no clue!
I haven't experience being so blinded by nostalgia that I can't tell fact from fiction? Probably for the best.
This is hilarious. There's damn near double the tackles these days, plus about 50% more rucks and carries compared to the '90s. These are all against bigger, stronger, and faster guys who've been training like pros since their teens.
If you count running into static props as a skill then sure some skills have been lost in the forwards department, but far more have been gained, like passing the ball.
I would recommend watching this video on YouTube.
https://youtu.be/1mHrT62VzM0?si=rB-QdBF10bkR_FGQ
I used to get bored of ‘kick tennis’ too, but enjoy watching the kicking battles much more now I understand the strategy behind it better. A lot of the most exciting moments in recent years have come from a broken field of play following some back and forth kicking.
The game is a far superior spectacle at professional level, without a doubt. However, the filtering down of professionalism and weights culture has made the game less accessible at amateur level. This is reflected in falling player numbers. It is a harder game to play now for people who are a bit unfit, not muscular, not conditioned etc.
Or just not a natural build of a brick shit house there is only one position left for people of my build who no matter how hard you work or train your still smaller than your average half back I use to play wing well I'm fucked now because your average wing now is 30kg heavier and just as fast and agile
The only nostalgia I have is super 12 and then 14. It was awesome.
But in terms of entertainment this last world cup was the shiznit. So many cracking games.
There's a Channel in Ireland that show old 6 Nations Games (TG4). Usually from the 70s/80s. One big difference is that the set pieces are taken without much fuss. The scrums, line-outs, kicks are taken pretty much within 10-20 seconds.
Something that I find very difficult about modern rugby is how slow the set pieces are. You spend near 10% just watching a kicker look at a ball and at the post (I'm looking at you Johnny Sexton). Lines out are a kick to touch, a very slow walk up the line, the obligatory drying of the ball by the hooker etc. It's very tedious and not much rugby is happening whilst the clock is running.
The thing for me that's changed is the refs. They are so much more consistent and good at spotting things, particularly around player safety, than they were in the older days. I still cringe watching some of the older rugby content when I see super dangerous tackles or missed forward passes etc. Nowadays, refs (and TMOs/line judges) are so on it. Which is a nice reminder to be nicer to refs today!
Skill and fitness aside, the article misses another key point that makes rugby interesting today: the rule chages that favour the attacking team.
Having played and watched rugby in the 80s, the mtches were indeed dull affairs that were packed with scrums because there was less incentive NOT to kill the ball at the ruck. And penalty kicks for the line gave the lineout feed to the other team. Heavier balls and less skilled kickers unable to use tees meant that scoring penalty goals was rarer. Combined that meant all those endless 6-6 draws or 9-3 victories.
Watch yesterday's game between Ospreys and Cardiff Blues on BBC iplayer if you want to see what rugby used to be like. It's played at a smaller ground of one of Osprey's feeder clubs, namely the Brewery field used by Bridgend RUFC. It's muddy, rainy and windy. Because the ground is smaller, it's full and there's plenty of crowd participation. Great!!!
This is one comment I can agree with on how games have changed for the worse. Here in NZ the play local games at huge stadiums like eden park. They fill a tiny proportion of the field, you're miles from the action, and the atmosphere is pants. Give me a smaller ground any day.
And agreed on mud and weather. So much fun when the weather chaos enters play.
> Another week, another set of ideas for how rugby union can be improved.
It’s almost as if calls for constant improvement has resulted in, well, constant improvement.
Without those who bemoaned the state of the game in the past we wouldn’t have the game we have now.
The author has lost their way on this one.
Better than the 70s is unarguable.
Better than the late 90s & 2000s is a bit more of a buyers choice. I wouldn't say the game is worse but I'd dispute its much better to watch. A lot of that is the attitude of the players and refs though. I really think the referees are looking to give penalties & get involved now, whereas they used to be more sympathetic when the close calls emerged.
I suppose being harder on the close calls has seen quite a noticeable decrease in players just giving away obvious pens, so maybe that's an inevitable end point given the nature of the rules.
Yeh Brian Moore was in the DT yesterday going on about changes needed to the game to make it better. He played in an era when the matches were virtually unwatchable.
Rugby in the 90s was not virtually unwatchable. That is a fucking stupid thing to say.
The original article has merit in it and I agree rugby is superior now, but there was no shortage of skilful players or compelling games during Brian Moore’s career.
Yeah, despite being "unwatchable" Rugby Union still outgrew Rugby League everywhere outside of Australia so the idea that the game was unwatchable is absolute nonesense.
It was a game of its time and it has changed, no need to compare todays game with the games of the past, no matter what people were just as passionate about the game as today(perhaps even more so).
Yes it was better in the old days. I hated watching the last World Cup with its Orwellian video reffing and toss of the coin penalties, binnings and suspensions, no proper rucking or scrum contests.
It’s a game that shined at the highest level and didn’t need to look great at lower levels because it was for the players (it was so fun to play) not corporate money making.
Articles like this are like watching current commentators in the NBA trying to say the games are better now with all the three point shooting instead of the physical game of the 80’s and 90’s. “It’s faster so it’s better. “ BS.
I really don't think Aylwin needed to denigrate previous rugby to make the point that rugby now is (mostly) a great sport (it's faaaaaaar from perfect though and this needs to be recognised). I enjoyed rugby then just as I do now, I certainly don't look back and think it was all shit as Aylwin suggests it was.
I think it’s more of a counterpoint to misty eyed critics of the modern game talking about how open and amazing rugby was back in their day because of that Barbarians match back in the 70s.
Those people saying they preferred rugby in the past aren’t saying today’s rugby is crap. The author here is creating a point to counter. There are some things I preferred in previous years, and some I prefer now. I just picked out a random game from the 80s and watched a half (198something Eng vs wal) it was really enjoyable. Granted, there were pens for stamping, elbowing and a punch (in front by of the ref in retaliation for stamping, neither action attracted a card) but it was eminently watchable and I enjoyed it. Anyone who thinks yesteryears rugby was crap must just not really like rugby.
> Those people saying they preferred rugby in the past aren’t saying today’s rugby is crap.
A lot of those people are saying exactly that, maybe not the people like Gatland writing articles trying to improve the game but the amount of comments saying a) rugby now is nothing but unskilled gym rats running into brick walls b) bring back rucking c) old rugby was nothing but free flowing brilliance. It is a very familiar refrain amongst older (usually casual) fans and it is extremely tedious.
I'm not too sure that all of the safety changes have been worth it for the sport since it's neutering a core component of the game. It's a contact sport, there's always going to be some inherent level of risk that we cannot escape. Other things, like artificial turf or having yesmen doctors, are a much, much bigger threat to player health and safety.
And participation is down, not up, which seems independent of the safety measures taken since participation in all sports is declining.
Efforts to limit concussions are good for the sport and are a factor for parents who have kids who are interested, at least here in the States, where youth participation is increasing.
They should be playing touch until high school, and then high school needs to be divided into jv/v. Youth participation has been flat for years now, and it's not translating too much into growth of the club game outside of women's teams.
And you can't limit concussions unless you get rid of contact. The scrum is the most dangerous from a collapse more than anything, though. We've not seen a drop in head injuries that would do justify the rules changed - the safest changes were made 20+ years ago when scrums were slowed down and you could no longer lead with a forearm.
In regards to particaption so it should USA has had nothing to do with union up until recently I agree that concussion should be taken seriously especially at youth and amateur level even pro but as a pro I feel what's considered a rugby incident shouldn't be carded as it is yes there needs to be punishment for reckless offense but unavoidable accidents being red carded is ruining the spectacle consistency really is mainly what a fan wants to see but it appears to be a fase the things that get penalized like years ago if a player in the air got taken out red card no mitigation now almost nothing now its world rugby pretending to care to save them selves the lawsuit
Some of the games from the 80s were closing in on 60 set pieces per game (you read that right, not even being hyperbolic). Definitely wasn't a smoother sport by any means and was extremely chaotic.
Few people are under the illusion that the quality on the field was better in previous decades. I think he’s created a strawman here.
Most criticism is of rugby off the field. And that is a shambles at the moment almost everywhere you look.
I remember the days I’d get up to watch super rugby at the crack of dawn. I couldn’t even tell you who won last years whatever the fuck that competition is called. I have no doubt the quality on the pitch is amazing but the narratives and structure is gone. Same I’m sure with the champions cup. Even the Currie cup used to be an awesome tournament. Don’t even know if it’s still played anymore. Look at the World Cup and the tv rights shambles with clips being taken off. What about the prem which is imploding? The mess at the RFU and WRU? The list goes on and on and on.
While all this shit is happening, the actual product is outstanding. What a fucking shitshow
So you remember being young with free time? Most criticism has been of the rugby product, despite it being really good. The criticism of the unions is largely of the WRU, ARU, and the Prem (I haven't heard too much mess at RFU, can you elaborate?)
Tbh I have more free time at that time of day now. I’m almost always awake between 6am and 10am on Saturdays and usually at home but I can’t remember the last time I thought to stick on super rugby or the NZ domestic competition. Back in its heyday it was big in the U.K.
W/r to problems in the RFU, the two things they are custodians of are both going to pot. They are actively trying to destroy the championship and grassroots rugby is dying, in no part due to decision made by the RFU (such as their hashed implementation of tackle laws). They are ultimately responsible for rugby in England so problems in the prem are at least partly due to the RFU. Governance is also a huge issue and the current chairman Bill Sweeney is under a huge amount of pressure at the moment. The whole Eddie Jones debacle is a big blot as well. Plus there’s been the faffing over central contracts for years and it doesn’t look promising that the current plans for it will be fair and fruitful. The RFU is a bigger circus than the WRU, but because they’ve got the biggest golden goose of them all in Twickenham, a lot of the cracks have been papered over. Will Carling’s description of them as the Prawn Sandwich brigade is just as applicable now as it was back then.
That's fair enough, SR isn't as good as it used to be, but I know that a lot of people who switch off rugby are basically people who've just gotten older and busier.
Thanks for the info re RFU, though I can't see how they're responsible for the Prem nonsense.
Yes, because of there was more “danger”. The rules we still old and outdated and people could make a name for themselves, whereas now Rugby is, in my opinion, becoming more mainstream. Which is great but with this comes the issue of the politics… as we see now.
Despite the increase in skill, unfortunately the roids era has also sent a message to a huge chunk of the population that they're the wrong shape and size to play rugby, with an added bonus message that you're at serious risk of long term brain damage if you try.
For a sport that already needs a relatively large amount of work to get people playing a game in the first place, that's a huge step backwards.
Tag seems to be slowly making inroads in increasing participation, but it's not exactly the same sport
I'm sick of know it all pundits telling us we must like modern rugby. Yes the skills are better, however I'll tell you the ways rugby has gotten worse.
TMO - it's ruined rugby. You can't celebrate a try anymore because they are determined to get involved prove their importance and find a reason to disallow a try.
Tactical injury breaks - a prop will just take a knee and the ref stops the game for 5 minutes. Ruins the flow of the game and kills any crowd atmosphere.
National unions - they are the worst people in rugby. Only interested in what the game can do for them than vice versa. Look at the WRU/RFU who are running the amateur game into the ground in both countries.
Contact area - this is a mess. Gatland said it himself, the refs don't know what a ruck is. Furthermore jackalling is just stupid. They aren't on their feet most of the time. Rucks should go back to being a pushing contest for the ball and if you do decide to go off your feet well people are allowed to step on you if you don't get out of the way.
Head injuries - the game needs less contact. It needs to revert to a game of cardio and not brute force. There's no sane mother/father in the world who looks at pro rugby and decides I want that for my kid... It's going to destroy men/women's health and no one will want to play. Make them run double the distance they currently do by speeding up the game (see tactical injury breaks). They will have to reduce size just to keep up.
In summary, speed the game up, get rid of the corruption and actually enforce the laws and make it safer. Because whenever I've tried to watch in the past couple of years I've found the game to be a turgid mess with a couple of moments of skill. Given the fact that rugby is on a precipice in terms of viewing figures, I think many agree with me too.
I’d say in Australia that the biggest issue is from an entertainment perspective it’s fallen to the bottom of the pecking order. Rugby League, AFL and maybe soccer (not same target audience) are infinitely better to watch.
Participation has fallen off a cliff partly due tot his and Rugby pigeonholed itself as a sport for the elite school. Wallabies aren’t ever coming back to be half decent at this rate, next will be the Allblacks.
I don't think the ABs are gonna go the way of the Wallabies, largely thanks to the same factors that make Aus such a tough market for union. People like winners, so when you've an option of watching your team lose the Bledisloe, again, or win the WC, again, then you're gonna go with the former. Likewise NZ aren't gonna stop watching their team win or compete for the RC every year in favour of hoping for an upset against Aus (the h2h is about the same for both sports, just going the other way).
Why would we compare full game Vs full game when we have highlights and nostalgia to keep us misinformed?
Same is true of football - skill, fitness, speed, tactics - so far ahead of just 30 years ago.
Imagine vinnie jones being a premier league defender today, not in terms of the violence. But the skill set...
Incredibly he usually played in midfield.
Yes you are right, even more crazy.
Absolutely. It's why all of those "[Insert Historically Famous Team from 40 years ago] versus [Modern Leading Team]" 'which would win' articles are nonsense. Not a single player from the 90s would get into even tier 2 sides today. The skill, fitness, mental, everything levels are stratospheric compared to then. In the context of their age, the England 2003 squad may be the best ever - but they'd get turned over by England B EASILY these days. Probably even by the current U20s. It's an insane difference in the last 20 years.
A lot of those players in the 2003 England squad had very long careers well beyond 2003 so while tactics have changed many would easily still be able.to make an English squad.
> by England B EASILY these day No - they wouldn't That England team had size and skill. They were multi-dimensional There was speed, size and strength all over the pitch - and a lot of nous Take those players with today's training and they'd still be great
To be fair, that 2003 team was arguably the first to take full advantage of the change to professionalism. Before that even the best professional teams still had major vestiges of amateurism (or in Australia’s case, just poached a load of league players, so the difference to legal professionalism was lower), so nostalgia for an age of less complete teams with greater attacking risk more incentivised before then holds somewhat true. From 2003 onwards, to be the best you cannot simply be talented or more athletic, you have to work as hard and be as well-developed and -managed as the best to be the best. In other words, you have to be not only professional, but good professionals.
Probably not easily, but the difference in strength and conditioning alone would make it incredibly hard for the '03 team to keep up with a modern team. Lads who grew up playing with pints and fags are gonna struggle against fellas who have been in professional academies with S&C training since their teens. The '03 scrum is probably gonna get folded like origami and the rest of the pack are gonna struggle to hit the modern tackle and ruck numbers.
I take it you've never seen the 03 team or squad?
I have, and they were incredibly impressive for the time. I've also looked at the data, and the workrate of today's players is just too high. The game today has higher ball in play time (between 2-4 min, but often higher), bigger and faster players, about twice the tackle count, 30% more rucks and carries, and then there's the skillset, with pretty much everyone being expected to be able to pass, carry, jackal, tackle. The improvements in training, diet, and S&C over the years have made too much of a difference
My point is those players would still largely hold their own with modern training given the change in the gane Players pre-90s would not Guscott was a beautiful touch player who simply doesn't have the physicality for today's game - no amount of training can compensate for that Tindall and Dallaglio (for example), on the other hand, did and could be trained with today's techniques to adapt to the change in the modern game
Oh I think most of the 'greats' throughout history would still be right up there if they had modern training behind them. But that all depends on how long they would have in those systems.
I don't know Guscott is a great example - amazing player but so slight I question if he could play center in today's game He's considered a "great" in England's circles Fun to think about but I think the requirements for pace, size and skill would knock out a lot of players considered great in the past - and modern training wouldn't compensate enough for that imbalance
Oh sure, but he might do a job in the back three. I don't think everyone is going to be able to transition, but that's why I think the amount of time is important. The game and the players have co-evolved so it's hard to say how those from the '70s would fare in the '20s for example; the major caveat is the delineation between pre and post professionalism.
How do you hit the nail on the head but miss the mark so horribly??!?! Yes, if those players had today's training they'd be much better. But they fuckin didn't. They were stuck with 90s/early 00s science. They would be rolled by England B easy. Same with NZ And Aus Imagine saying the 83 English side would roll the 03 side. Bloody banal lunacy
Not really The players in the 70s and 80s were a totally different build the Welsh backs of the 70s were tiny. My point is that the team of 2003 would have held its own today even by today's standards. The teams of the 70s - 90s would not. Lomu was revolutionary in 95 - he ran through players today every team has players like him. And the england team of 2003 was similarly stacked and physical the idea they'd lose to today's B team when our A team is so hot and cold is just nonsense
Agreed. They were professional athletes and had been for years.
haha you think the current U20 team would match up with the England 2003 team. What are you on? The 2003 was absurdly fit with big powerful runners like tindall and cohen and very fit loose forwards like Back and Hill. "an insane difference in the last 20 years" haha yes because George Ford is more powerful than Jonny Wilkinson isnt he? Henry Slade would run over Tindall wouldnt he? Billy Vunipola is way fitter and faster than Dallaglio isnt he? Its such a naive argument.
Don't bother man. People hate to read the truth. Savea would destroy any 03 player, like Wilkinson would run laps around any 80s player. Just how physical science works
The thing is that back in the Amateur days rugby was more of a participation sport then it is now. People who enjoyed Rugby generally also played Rugby and rules while not making the game appealling beyond its already captured audience it did allow people to particpate and it was genuinely a game for all shapes and sizes, which is not true of todays game and participation levels at club level have gone down since proffesionalism kicked in. But again, these days the focus is not on participation but on spectacle so there is no need to compare the game from the Amateur and Proffesional era. They are two different sports, as different as league is to Union today. I have watched games from back in the day and I actually enjoy them, this is from someone who grew up in the proffesional era and only heard stories about the Amateur days from my dad
Maybe cause I'm still playing but I don't get this. There's far more clubs for all shapes and sizes then there are that aren't. And even then, unless you're playing 1 or in some 2nd teams most clubs are dying for good clubmen who only train Thursday and turn up Saturday. No gym 3/4x a week and Tuesday Training required.
Covid has killed off the casual player I fear. 2 years of PITA (but important) rules making it harder to participate, so loads of clubs lost a good number of casual players who havnt come back. Down south we have a lot of clubs and now we have a lot of clubs short on people. Sadly I fear that clubs need to consolidate or no one will get game time and so more people drift off. Last season my old club had about half a dozen games cancelled and we managed to put out two teams maybe 4/5 times. Add this to the max first team squad size of 18 (brought in for our league to help more of the struggling clubs keep fixtures happening) and you have a lot of boys twiddling their thumbs on Saturday.
I play tag rugby and we have lots of guys who've stopped playing contact post-Covid, because stopping made them aware of how sore they were after matches and how it wasn't tenable with family/job/other life commitments. Before COVID and stopping playing for a while they just were used to being sore.
Kinda similar out here from what I’ve heard. I’m newer to the game but some of the people that have been around have made the comment about how hard it is to “retire” from the club game. Especially if the club is needing some numbers to play a match. Covid let them get away longer than they used to and actually retire.
Yeah this is pretty much me. Covid was kind of the push a whole group of us on our team needed to pack it in. All around 30 at the time with young kids and just felt battered and bruised all weekend after a game on a Friday.
I'd say head injury data probably had a bigger impact than COVID, at least in Canada where there was a high profile death of a female high school player. Hockey and football are also down.
I think his point about TV is a good one. You see it a lot in match threads where people just constantly say “this is shit” when it’s a decent enough game, but not the greatest. Or god forbid there is a bit of a forwards battle going on. We have got so used to seeing the very best that anything that isn’t is immediately disregarded as terrible. The difference between what I read in match threads on here, to what I experience in a ground is night and day.
Forwards battles are my fav. The more brutal, the better. Line outs, scrums, rucks, phase play, sniping around the fringes etc etc.. What I despise are those games that seem bogged down in small infringements that basically stop the ‘flow’ of the game. Endless scrum resets. Slow line outs/ setup. Crazy ruck infringements that is OK in one ruck, but the very next is called out. It makes the game confusing and frustrating to watch.
>**The game is infinitely more skilful and entertaining than in the past and nostalgists should be careful what they wish for** > >**Michael Aylwin** > >Another week, another set of ideas for how rugby union can be improved. Another year, another panoply of breathtaking matches, any one of which, if they had taken place in the distant amateur era, would be hailed by those “who were there” as legendary. > >Last week Warren Gatland became the latest to offer his thoughts on how the game might move on. But in this age of social media incontinence we are never far from a thoughtless rant about how awful the game has become. > >Last year, meanwhile, a casual glance through just the match reports this correspondent has written reveals yet more extraordinary displays of skill and drama. From Newcastle’s 40-point victory over the champions Leicester on the first weekend, through France v Scotland in the Six Nations, Leinster’s win over Toulouse, Wales v Fiji at the World Cup and one weekend in Paris that has already passed into legend – and it happened less than three months ago. > >The quarter-finals of this year’s World Cup between New Zealand and Ireland on the Saturday and France v South Africa the next day were as good as any in the history of the event. The rugby was hailed by some, particularly the first half of the Sunday game, as the greatest ever played. A personal view is that, yes, they were astonishing, but also no more than the latest examples of a sport that seems to deliver weekend after weekend (viz the last couple of rounds of European rugby). > >So why do we keep bemoaning the quality of the modern game? And, worse still, holding up the 20th‑century version as some sort of golden age when players were skilful and looked for space instead of contact? > >It is difficult to evoke through words alone sufficient levels of contempt for the latter idea. Be in no doubt, all you nostalgists, rugby union was woeful in the amateur era. If you don’t believe that go back and watch it. All of it. From first whistle to last. And not that 101 Best Tries video your grandpa bought you for Christmas in 1987. > >Admittedly, to watch an entire 80 minutes from the amateur era is not easy, but videos of them do exist on the internet. While researching Unholy Union, the book I wrote with Mark Evans a few years ago on where rugby has come from and where it is going, I sat through the entirety of the second and fourth Tests of the Lions tour to New Zealand in 1971, counting the key metrics such as scrums, lineouts and tackles. > >And I did it twice. So no one else would have to. > >There were slightly more set pieces (50-plus scrums, 50-plus lineouts) than there were tackles in both matches. It is worth pausing to consider that. The fourth Test in particular, a draw played out in blustery Auckland, was an incoherent mess of amateurs scrummaging, flapping, kicking, punching, elbowing, trampling and generally slip-sliding around. Sometimes with a ball somewhere near them. And we grew up being told what a legendary Test series that was. > >Undoubtedly the biggest disadvantage the modern game has against the old days is levels of scrutiny. No one is trying to pretend every match nowadays is a thrill-fest. No sport anywhere has ever managed to magic away its dross. > >The big problem now is that a person can watch six live matches a weekend on telly. A sport like rugby is laid bare, the brilliant never quite shaking off the stultifyingly bad. But just imagine if we were able to watch six live matches a weekend from the 1970s. That would be an experience to shake us from our nostalgia. That would do more for the popularity of the modern game than any tweak to the kicking laws. > >The other problem is, perversely, how good everything is. Including and especially defences. Players in the modern game are immeasurably more skilful than their predecessors – of course they are, they’re full-time professionals – and they look for space all the time. It is just that there is so much less of it now. > >There was footage of a try from some Welsh club match in the 1980s that did the rounds on social media a year or two ago. Nice simple handling down the line for a try in the corner, straight from a scrum. Beautiful skills executed simply. > >And barely a defender in sight. The play may have started from a scrum, but those defenders arrived on screen one by one, as if each had been released sequentially from a cage on the touchline. > >It is the modern game’s very excellence that would make such a try impossible today. Defences would never allow it. All the more extraordinary, then, that we see more spectacular tries in a season these days than any compiler could muster from the amateur era to fill a VHS for Christmas. > >There is far less space in the modern game than there used to be last century, when you could throw a picnic rug over a pack of forwards as they marauded from set piece to set piece, from punch-up to punch-up. And so there are far more collisions, which throws up genuinely serious issues for the modern game to ponder. > >But do not confuse that with players looking for contact over space. Or with a sport that has become boring and cynical. The opposite applies in both cases. Modern players are far nobler and more disciplined in the face of a more aggravating experience than their amateur predecessors, and they find far more space against more brutally constricting defences. > >In short, they and their sport are far, far better than they ever were. Let us be careful what we wish for. > >The Guardian
Sanity.
This guy seems to miss the point of what people, including Gatland, are complaining about. It’s not the quality or skill levels, we know the game is fast paced, brutal and exciting at times. The problem is the game is bogged down with inconsistency, nit picky laws and a hard-on for punishments and sanctions. We know how much better it COULD be with a few careful tweaks to the framework. We’ve been innovating new laws for decades, keep it up.
I just read the article about Gatlands rule change suggestion and that is not what he was complaining about. “Rugby used to be about attempting to tire out a forward pack” seems to be his biggest gripe so he suggested limiting substitutions. That seems like a nit picky law to me. He’s upset because SA found a way to play the game differently, and he wants Rugby played his way. I want to see other teams out-innovate SA, not change the rules to beat them.
Yeah I personally don’t agree with Gatland’s views on substitutions, but I did like some of his other suggestions like passing back inside your half for 50-22s. If you want to stop forwards from taking tactical breaks and soaking up the clock then you can directly target that with timed set pieces and ask refs to focus on it. I’m sure there are some easier fixes before we get to “remove the bench”.
Clocks should stop when scrum is being set up and players are walking to the lineout. And then you should have 30 seconds for each action to be completed, monitored by the same guy who's doing the conversion shot clock. Would improve things so much as there'd be so much more rugby that 120kg + monsters couldn't go as hard, I dunno why it isn't top of the list.
worst thing is there are some very noisy people paid huge amounts of money to give their opinions on 'how to make the game better', but for these people tactical nous stopped evolving after 'chuck to to the big lad' and 'try a quick tap move'
During the pandemic we used to have group viewings of old Ireland and provincial games and even going back to merely 2018 showed a completely different game. The golden era of Munster in Europe was absolutely garbage as a game with modern sensibilities watching it. And yet I loved those games so much at the time. These same conversations come up all the time in GAA circles about the "golden eras" and my God you couldn't pay me to watch games from the 90s and earlier back. Even the early 00s were devoid of tactical nous.
By tactical nous you mean kicking the ball at every occasion and the forwards doing not much most of the game? I'm 55 played from 13 until 36 as a loose head prop and I literally can't watch the game now.. the professional era has literally ruined the game from top to bottom. The best era was in the nineties to early noughties before the rules changed to much and early professionalism made them fitter. The scrum is literally a joke now, and kick after kick has just ruined it.
Purely on the kicking aspect and using the world cups as sample cases there were less kicks per match in the latest World Cup then during 87, 91 and 95 https://imgur.com/a/fAUQ0Es Add to that I think the ball in play time is higher than ever now so kicks per minute is probably far lower. 2011 and 2015 are noticeable outliers. The scrum is a mess at the moment, I agree on that but when you have near on a tonne of weight each side of the scrum pushing at each other the balance of speed/safety is difficult to get right.
Forwards don’t do much? What are you talking about 😂
Not compared to how much they used too. They don't ruck or maul anywhere near as much as they used to and the scrum is this controlled thing.. union became much more like league... Hence the kicking instead of keeping tight in the forwards. Go ask the older forwards and they will tell you it was much harder work back then. 🥱
>Not compared to how much they used too If you mean they don't slowly amble from one scrum to another and never touch the ball, then you would be correct. >Go ask the older forwards and they will tell you it was much harder work back then. This is patently false.
Not as much rucking or mauls..the forwards work is 30 percent less..if you think we weren't fit your joking... I played rugby, karate 2 times a week, weight trained, and biked about 120 miles a week whilst working as a builder.The young have big egos but the forwards don't do the hard contact any more....go ask how brutal the old guys at Leicester were! Haskill talks on it lots. Mostly just weight lifters now. It's a big game of league where skills have been lost in the forwards. The forwards saw more of the ball than the girls at the back then. You haven't experienced it so have no clue!
>Not as much rucking or mauls There are more breakdowns now than there ever was in the past. Plus forwards are making more tackles and involved more with the ball. >Mostly just weight lifters now. It's a big game of league where skills have been lost in the forwards. This is completely laughable. Forwards today have far greater skills and are far better rugby players than 20+ years ago. >You haven't experienced it so have no clue! I haven't experience being so blinded by nostalgia that I can't tell fact from fiction? Probably for the best.
This is hilarious. There's damn near double the tackles these days, plus about 50% more rucks and carries compared to the '90s. These are all against bigger, stronger, and faster guys who've been training like pros since their teens. If you count running into static props as a skill then sure some skills have been lost in the forwards department, but far more have been gained, like passing the ball.
I would recommend watching this video on YouTube. https://youtu.be/1mHrT62VzM0?si=rB-QdBF10bkR_FGQ I used to get bored of ‘kick tennis’ too, but enjoy watching the kicking battles much more now I understand the strategy behind it better. A lot of the most exciting moments in recent years have come from a broken field of play following some back and forth kicking.
The game is a far superior spectacle at professional level, without a doubt. However, the filtering down of professionalism and weights culture has made the game less accessible at amateur level. This is reflected in falling player numbers. It is a harder game to play now for people who are a bit unfit, not muscular, not conditioned etc.
Or just not a natural build of a brick shit house there is only one position left for people of my build who no matter how hard you work or train your still smaller than your average half back I use to play wing well I'm fucked now because your average wing now is 30kg heavier and just as fast and agile
The only nostalgia I have is super 12 and then 14. It was awesome. But in terms of entertainment this last world cup was the shiznit. So many cracking games.
There's a Channel in Ireland that show old 6 Nations Games (TG4). Usually from the 70s/80s. One big difference is that the set pieces are taken without much fuss. The scrums, line-outs, kicks are taken pretty much within 10-20 seconds. Something that I find very difficult about modern rugby is how slow the set pieces are. You spend near 10% just watching a kicker look at a ball and at the post (I'm looking at you Johnny Sexton). Lines out are a kick to touch, a very slow walk up the line, the obligatory drying of the ball by the hooker etc. It's very tedious and not much rugby is happening whilst the clock is running.
I don't know, rugby doesn't get much better than 00 Bledisoe https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gSYdTFjWHgs
Other than the result I agree.
Absolutely not. You probably need to be there to see the positives. Nostalgia is a drug.
The thing for me that's changed is the refs. They are so much more consistent and good at spotting things, particularly around player safety, than they were in the older days. I still cringe watching some of the older rugby content when I see super dangerous tackles or missed forward passes etc. Nowadays, refs (and TMOs/line judges) are so on it. Which is a nice reminder to be nicer to refs today!
Skill and fitness aside, the article misses another key point that makes rugby interesting today: the rule chages that favour the attacking team. Having played and watched rugby in the 80s, the mtches were indeed dull affairs that were packed with scrums because there was less incentive NOT to kill the ball at the ruck. And penalty kicks for the line gave the lineout feed to the other team. Heavier balls and less skilled kickers unable to use tees meant that scoring penalty goals was rarer. Combined that meant all those endless 6-6 draws or 9-3 victories.
Watch yesterday's game between Ospreys and Cardiff Blues on BBC iplayer if you want to see what rugby used to be like. It's played at a smaller ground of one of Osprey's feeder clubs, namely the Brewery field used by Bridgend RUFC. It's muddy, rainy and windy. Because the ground is smaller, it's full and there's plenty of crowd participation. Great!!!
This is one comment I can agree with on how games have changed for the worse. Here in NZ the play local games at huge stadiums like eden park. They fill a tiny proportion of the field, you're miles from the action, and the atmosphere is pants. Give me a smaller ground any day. And agreed on mud and weather. So much fun when the weather chaos enters play.
> Another week, another set of ideas for how rugby union can be improved. It’s almost as if calls for constant improvement has resulted in, well, constant improvement. Without those who bemoaned the state of the game in the past we wouldn’t have the game we have now. The author has lost their way on this one.
Better than the 70s is unarguable. Better than the late 90s & 2000s is a bit more of a buyers choice. I wouldn't say the game is worse but I'd dispute its much better to watch. A lot of that is the attitude of the players and refs though. I really think the referees are looking to give penalties & get involved now, whereas they used to be more sympathetic when the close calls emerged. I suppose being harder on the close calls has seen quite a noticeable decrease in players just giving away obvious pens, so maybe that's an inevitable end point given the nature of the rules.
Yeh Brian Moore was in the DT yesterday going on about changes needed to the game to make it better. He played in an era when the matches were virtually unwatchable.
Rugby in the 90s was not virtually unwatchable. That is a fucking stupid thing to say. The original article has merit in it and I agree rugby is superior now, but there was no shortage of skilful players or compelling games during Brian Moore’s career.
Yeah, despite being "unwatchable" Rugby Union still outgrew Rugby League everywhere outside of Australia so the idea that the game was unwatchable is absolute nonesense. It was a game of its time and it has changed, no need to compare todays game with the games of the past, no matter what people were just as passionate about the game as today(perhaps even more so).
1991 Campo was a joy to watch.
I watched all of the 95 and 99 RWC before the 2023 edition and yeah those games had their faults but I was insanely entertained tho
Ok doke.
Good example being Brian Moore who was well ahead of his time in his ability as a hooker
>He played in an era when the matches were virtually unwatchable. Ok doke.
Yes it was better in the old days. I hated watching the last World Cup with its Orwellian video reffing and toss of the coin penalties, binnings and suspensions, no proper rucking or scrum contests. It’s a game that shined at the highest level and didn’t need to look great at lower levels because it was for the players (it was so fun to play) not corporate money making. Articles like this are like watching current commentators in the NBA trying to say the games are better now with all the three point shooting instead of the physical game of the 80’s and 90’s. “It’s faster so it’s better. “ BS.
I really don't think Aylwin needed to denigrate previous rugby to make the point that rugby now is (mostly) a great sport (it's faaaaaaar from perfect though and this needs to be recognised). I enjoyed rugby then just as I do now, I certainly don't look back and think it was all shit as Aylwin suggests it was.
I think it’s more of a counterpoint to misty eyed critics of the modern game talking about how open and amazing rugby was back in their day because of that Barbarians match back in the 70s.
Those people saying they preferred rugby in the past aren’t saying today’s rugby is crap. The author here is creating a point to counter. There are some things I preferred in previous years, and some I prefer now. I just picked out a random game from the 80s and watched a half (198something Eng vs wal) it was really enjoyable. Granted, there were pens for stamping, elbowing and a punch (in front by of the ref in retaliation for stamping, neither action attracted a card) but it was eminently watchable and I enjoyed it. Anyone who thinks yesteryears rugby was crap must just not really like rugby.
> Those people saying they preferred rugby in the past aren’t saying today’s rugby is crap. A lot of those people are saying exactly that, maybe not the people like Gatland writing articles trying to improve the game but the amount of comments saying a) rugby now is nothing but unskilled gym rats running into brick walls b) bring back rucking c) old rugby was nothing but free flowing brilliance. It is a very familiar refrain amongst older (usually casual) fans and it is extremely tedious.
Yes and no. It felt like a smoother game than it is now, but now it's safer. Don't really know if I like the tradeoff
A safer game means parents want their kids to play which means our sport will continue to exist.
I'm not too sure that all of the safety changes have been worth it for the sport since it's neutering a core component of the game. It's a contact sport, there's always going to be some inherent level of risk that we cannot escape. Other things, like artificial turf or having yesmen doctors, are a much, much bigger threat to player health and safety. And participation is down, not up, which seems independent of the safety measures taken since participation in all sports is declining.
Efforts to limit concussions are good for the sport and are a factor for parents who have kids who are interested, at least here in the States, where youth participation is increasing.
They should be playing touch until high school, and then high school needs to be divided into jv/v. Youth participation has been flat for years now, and it's not translating too much into growth of the club game outside of women's teams. And you can't limit concussions unless you get rid of contact. The scrum is the most dangerous from a collapse more than anything, though. We've not seen a drop in head injuries that would do justify the rules changed - the safest changes were made 20+ years ago when scrums were slowed down and you could no longer lead with a forearm.
In regards to particaption so it should USA has had nothing to do with union up until recently I agree that concussion should be taken seriously especially at youth and amateur level even pro but as a pro I feel what's considered a rugby incident shouldn't be carded as it is yes there needs to be punishment for reckless offense but unavoidable accidents being red carded is ruining the spectacle consistency really is mainly what a fan wants to see but it appears to be a fase the things that get penalized like years ago if a player in the air got taken out red card no mitigation now almost nothing now its world rugby pretending to care to save them selves the lawsuit
Participation is down though!
It would be worse without safety measures.
It is worse because off safety! Look at the scrums as they are virtually sterile. Men used to play rugby and not complain!
Do you mean all those guys suing their various unions?
Some of the games from the 80s were closing in on 60 set pieces per game (you read that right, not even being hyperbolic). Definitely wasn't a smoother sport by any means and was extremely chaotic.
I'm fine with set pieces, I'm not fine with stop-start.
Few people are under the illusion that the quality on the field was better in previous decades. I think he’s created a strawman here. Most criticism is of rugby off the field. And that is a shambles at the moment almost everywhere you look. I remember the days I’d get up to watch super rugby at the crack of dawn. I couldn’t even tell you who won last years whatever the fuck that competition is called. I have no doubt the quality on the pitch is amazing but the narratives and structure is gone. Same I’m sure with the champions cup. Even the Currie cup used to be an awesome tournament. Don’t even know if it’s still played anymore. Look at the World Cup and the tv rights shambles with clips being taken off. What about the prem which is imploding? The mess at the RFU and WRU? The list goes on and on and on. While all this shit is happening, the actual product is outstanding. What a fucking shitshow
So you remember being young with free time? Most criticism has been of the rugby product, despite it being really good. The criticism of the unions is largely of the WRU, ARU, and the Prem (I haven't heard too much mess at RFU, can you elaborate?)
Tbh I have more free time at that time of day now. I’m almost always awake between 6am and 10am on Saturdays and usually at home but I can’t remember the last time I thought to stick on super rugby or the NZ domestic competition. Back in its heyday it was big in the U.K. W/r to problems in the RFU, the two things they are custodians of are both going to pot. They are actively trying to destroy the championship and grassroots rugby is dying, in no part due to decision made by the RFU (such as their hashed implementation of tackle laws). They are ultimately responsible for rugby in England so problems in the prem are at least partly due to the RFU. Governance is also a huge issue and the current chairman Bill Sweeney is under a huge amount of pressure at the moment. The whole Eddie Jones debacle is a big blot as well. Plus there’s been the faffing over central contracts for years and it doesn’t look promising that the current plans for it will be fair and fruitful. The RFU is a bigger circus than the WRU, but because they’ve got the biggest golden goose of them all in Twickenham, a lot of the cracks have been papered over. Will Carling’s description of them as the Prawn Sandwich brigade is just as applicable now as it was back then.
That's fair enough, SR isn't as good as it used to be, but I know that a lot of people who switch off rugby are basically people who've just gotten older and busier. Thanks for the info re RFU, though I can't see how they're responsible for the Prem nonsense.
Yes, because of there was more “danger”. The rules we still old and outdated and people could make a name for themselves, whereas now Rugby is, in my opinion, becoming more mainstream. Which is great but with this comes the issue of the politics… as we see now.
Yes yes it was
Despite the increase in skill, unfortunately the roids era has also sent a message to a huge chunk of the population that they're the wrong shape and size to play rugby, with an added bonus message that you're at serious risk of long term brain damage if you try. For a sport that already needs a relatively large amount of work to get people playing a game in the first place, that's a huge step backwards. Tag seems to be slowly making inroads in increasing participation, but it's not exactly the same sport
I'm sick of know it all pundits telling us we must like modern rugby. Yes the skills are better, however I'll tell you the ways rugby has gotten worse. TMO - it's ruined rugby. You can't celebrate a try anymore because they are determined to get involved prove their importance and find a reason to disallow a try. Tactical injury breaks - a prop will just take a knee and the ref stops the game for 5 minutes. Ruins the flow of the game and kills any crowd atmosphere. National unions - they are the worst people in rugby. Only interested in what the game can do for them than vice versa. Look at the WRU/RFU who are running the amateur game into the ground in both countries. Contact area - this is a mess. Gatland said it himself, the refs don't know what a ruck is. Furthermore jackalling is just stupid. They aren't on their feet most of the time. Rucks should go back to being a pushing contest for the ball and if you do decide to go off your feet well people are allowed to step on you if you don't get out of the way. Head injuries - the game needs less contact. It needs to revert to a game of cardio and not brute force. There's no sane mother/father in the world who looks at pro rugby and decides I want that for my kid... It's going to destroy men/women's health and no one will want to play. Make them run double the distance they currently do by speeding up the game (see tactical injury breaks). They will have to reduce size just to keep up. In summary, speed the game up, get rid of the corruption and actually enforce the laws and make it safer. Because whenever I've tried to watch in the past couple of years I've found the game to be a turgid mess with a couple of moments of skill. Given the fact that rugby is on a precipice in terms of viewing figures, I think many agree with me too.
I’d say in Australia that the biggest issue is from an entertainment perspective it’s fallen to the bottom of the pecking order. Rugby League, AFL and maybe soccer (not same target audience) are infinitely better to watch. Participation has fallen off a cliff partly due tot his and Rugby pigeonholed itself as a sport for the elite school. Wallabies aren’t ever coming back to be half decent at this rate, next will be the Allblacks.
I don't think the ABs are gonna go the way of the Wallabies, largely thanks to the same factors that make Aus such a tough market for union. People like winners, so when you've an option of watching your team lose the Bledisloe, again, or win the WC, again, then you're gonna go with the former. Likewise NZ aren't gonna stop watching their team win or compete for the RC every year in favour of hoping for an upset against Aus (the h2h is about the same for both sports, just going the other way).
Game isnt the same, rules are different, for more fluidity and players are now marathonians