Absolutely. His versatility has worked against him in my opinion. He can play centre but is much much better at 10.
I enjoy watching rugby union but have never played it and admit to being baffled by some of the rules. A couple of questions for you afficionados... 1 ) Why are some many forward passes ignored? 2) Why is there not even any pretence at putting the ball straight into the scrum? Apologies for my ignorance.
That's a reasonable summary for the forward pass, the put in at the scrum used to be alot straighter than it is nowadays and I can't recall why it's changed.
That all sounds like bollocks to me (a bit like the VAR ****e we have to put up with in football) but then I don't really care about this so much. What about the put in to the scrum then, is there an explanation for that nonsense? In my innocence, I thought a hooker's job was to hook the ball back in the scrum. but the accepted norm now seems to be to direct the ball completely away from the front row, sometimes straight to the back row of the team with the put in. Is this now within the rules or is it just ignored by officials?
Me too. When I was in the Fire Brigade, we had a couple of rugby players on my watch and as we watched the games they explained what was going on and why. I've been out of the job for 7 years next month, so although I still watch the game I haven't got the insight to comment on here. Today for instance, Farrell took a massive hit and then the Italian tried to throttle him. No action taken. Then a few minutes later the English scrum were making a play for a try, an Italian did something wrong ( which seemed rather innocuous ) and England were awarded a penalty try and the Italian sent off following a yellow card.
Great questions Rugby is an incredibly complex game and TBH, a game that is very difficult to ref. When watching a pass I was always told watch both the hands and the first meter. After that the ball can and will naturally drift especially over longer passes. Apparently, as Hammersmith’s excellent link above highlights, it’s just natural gravity. The direction the hands are pointing in at the moment of the throw is the biggest indicator. Not an exact science I know. I stand to be corrected but I think the ball should still be put into the scrum straight. Have no idea why it’s not officiated better
I don’t understand how refs in an ordinary game can possibly do the complex trigonometry in real time to judge the pass. Ok if you have a bloke with a telly and multiple angles to help. The scrum has been a joke for years. If the ball did go in straight I would be surprised if the hookers still had the skills and practice to actually hook it. I’m guessing that refs want the scrums over quickly because they are so dangerous and technical, repeated put ins could lead to disaster. When my lad was playing if it became clear that there was a big imbalance in the strength and skills of the forwards in the scrum refs switched to uncontested scrums very quickly, doubtless for safety reasons. When was the last time you saw a scrum lost against the head in a professional game? One thing my son, who knows a lot more about the game than me having played it, and I noticed yesterday was the odd disparity about tackling rules. An Italian player was carrying the ball forward, and deliberately led with his shoulder into the upper body/head of an approaching England tackler- the Italian had to dip his body quite a lot to achieve this. Not even commented on, let alone called as a foul, when it would have been a possible yellow if committed by the tackling player rather than the ball carrier. Possession seems to bring a get out of jail free card with it.
The law hasn’t changed - the ball technically should be put into the scrum ‘straight’, rather than into the second row. As for forward passes, increasingly officials at all levels consider that the ball only needs to leave a player's hands in a backward direction, with the understanding that as a player runs forward and passes, the ball will often go forward towards the opposition dead-ball line, but backwards or laterally out of the hands of the advancing passer of the ball….
Most teams now, especially those with smaller packs, simply lock out their scrum instead of really contesting. I know Ireland tend to do this a lot against bigger packs. As long as you get quick ball (not straight throw in) you can stay stable long enough not to get pinged by the ref. Instead of gaining forward momentum, Ireland instead look to create multiple options at first receiver. Simple but effective.
It was ever thus with the WRU … I had direct contact with them frequently in the 1990s and again (indeed more so) in the mid to late 2010s - in my experience, they are worse now.
