There is only one thing tempering the fever pitch excitement at the prospect of the Autumn Internationals. Martin Johnson takes charge, Danny Cipriani is fit again, the Big Three are all coming to Twickenham – and there’s an array of other reasons to be cheerful.
Nevertheless, the potential impact of the ELVs seems to hang in the air, as unwelcome as Neil Back at Thomond Park.
During some of the games I’ve seen this season, the ELVs have gone largely unnoticed and the high standard of domestic rugby has been maintained; but for others, where the ELVs have reared their ugly head, the impact has only been negative.
We haven’t seen a more free-running game with tries galore, and although reports suggest that the ball is in play slightly longer, one commentator suggested that it’s not much use when it’s 50 feet in the air. The experiment appears to have proven that wholesale changes in rules will produce effects that had not previously been imagined in the Australian law laboratory, and that actually, we don’t need to change the rules anyway.
The most obvious side effect is the seemingly ceaseless end-to-end kicking that dominated the Super 14 and that has been brought to the Northern Hemisphere. Full backs are kicking in field which obbiously keeps the ball alive, but how many times has the retrieving side actually counter-attacked as the law proponents envisaged?
Instead, they have just booted it back to where it came from with the result that five-minute spells are ridden with an exchange of aerial table tennis until someone makes a mistake. You can only sympathise with the forwards as they run back and forth, largely unrewarded but determined nonetheless, just in case the ball is spilled.
The referees’ interpretation of laws in the tackle area have also led to some baffling decisions, and the inconsistency has been stifling games. The safest option is to kick long, play in the opposition territory just in case you turn the ball over or give away a penalty in kicking range.
Many rugby supporters would say that in the most enjoyable games, the referee hardly gets noticed. The IRB’s tinkering with rules has meant that the referee – and their own interpretation of the laws – is often becoming the centre of focus, and their impact on the result is arguably too great. Referees ought to blend into the occasion, allowing the teams to play without confused whistling and constant interruption.
My fear of the ELVs is actually two-fold: not only does this kicking calamity become a bore to watch, but it doesn’t really play into England’s hands as in-play kicking is rarely a strength – remember that 36-0 drubbing in the World Cup when Andy Farrell et al gifted the Springboks plenty of ball?
If we are kicking aimlessly against the likes of Adam Ashley-Cooper and Mils Muliaina this autumn, they might just not kick it back and run through us instead. The implications could be a heavy defeat that is tedious to see – not what anyone wants!
Surely the trial has proved enough already and it’s time for the ‘brains’ behind the ELVs to wind their necks in and pretend this outrageous episode never happened?
What are your thoughts on the ELVs? Has anyone had their leg broken by a collapsed maul yet?
Spike “That is why i reject the ELV’s out of hand regardless of the fact they might be being drip-fed into the game or the fact that standing 5m behind a scrum might not actually be all that bad.”
Thanks for proving my point. You just don’t want change. There were guys like you around when we upped the points for tries, legalised lifting and stopped 9s from binding to the scrum. There’s a great piss-take of your attitude here
Kemlo And don’t give me this crap about refs then awarding yellow cards and full arms if it carries on, that is just plain confusing. You really find that confusing? Thankfully refs and the rest of the rugby community who work with TWO sets of cards (yellow and red) don’t.
Additionally, your laughable attempts to claim northern hemipshere coaches are behind it are exposed in this article. The only laughable thing is your comprehension of the article you reference. My point is that a bunch of international coaches, including Nthn Hemispher ones, saw the need for the game to change in 2003, which then led to the ELVs.
You’ve got one of them, Geech, saying he doesn’t like the line-out and maul rules. You’ve missed the point. As for your Fiji rant, wrong again. My point wasn’t contemptuous of Fiji, quite the opposite; that it was hardly surprising to see a running game from the masters of sevens. But I thought that sort of rugby was worthless in the 15 aside game according to the boring brigade?
Gagger, have you read this report…? It’s a fairly comprehensive assessment, by an Aussie. And I’m afraid I’m with Spike – it’s not that we are anti-change, full stop; it’s that we are anti-change for change’s sake when it is completely unnecessary since the game is flourishing the Northern Hemisphere.
Let’s try to keep any discussion objective rather than personal, without resorting to expletives…
The Air New Zealand Cup final has just finished 7-6. Sounds like a rubbish game, can we change the rules again?
As I said Gagger, if you could please just explain why the example I gave in my second post shows the ELVs to be better. Ta.
I thought it was obvious. In your scenario we get the riveting sight of penalty shoot outs from 40 yards. In fact, teams don’t need to have any attacking threat in your scenario, they can just grind out breakdown after breakdown until the ref finds something and bingo, 3 points and all momentum is taken out of the game.
The sanction law pushes your team to have an attacking threat and go for a try. Should the defending side repeatedly try and stop them illegally, then they can lose someone for 10 minutes. This is a complexity that refs already seem to be able to deal with.
I think Gagger is 100% wrong.
Case closed.
That’s unaustralian.