Always a Wasp

to play for Wasps and to captain England at Rugby.

He was on Radio6Live earlier today, and was talking about parents aims for their children.

There are various "interpretations" of the laws that annoy me no end, for example

• not putting the ball into a scrum straight, so causing the scrum to be a means of gaining a penalty rather than a competitive restart
  
• the driving maul, which is the only form of legalised obstruction still left in the game
• the incessant running roundduring the leadup to the throw-in at line outs

However the thing that has annoyed me more, the last few years, and no more so than the final on Saturday where Exeter used it at almost every ruck, was the continually bringing-in extra forwards to increase the length of the caterpillar to give the scrum half better protection to enable him to get his box kick away.

It looks like I am not the only one who gets annoyed with it as this Loose Pass articled by Lawrence Nolan from Planet Rugby shows:

The end of the caterpillar

Nearly every law update, every reinforcement of existing laws, every tweak to the regulations covering game play, is designed to do one of three things: make the game safer, improve the flow of the game for the fans, and help referees analyse the game’s contact situations almost algorithmically to help achieve consistency and understanding for all.

Mostly, they work. The game has sped up. Ball in play time is more than 50 per cent up on what it was a handful of years ago. Although rucks are still the issue of many an argument and referees are still subject to deeply unfair scrutiny at every contact situation, they are easier to observe and understand for all.

One of the better ones, so we all at PR Towers thought a few years ago, was the ‘use it’ call, whereby referees would call ‘use it’ when he saw the ball available and then give the attacking team five seconds before giving a scrum to the opposition. Later, this aspect was further simplified by the referee’s ability to declare the ruck won and warn defending players not to try and steal (although counter-rucks were still allowed). And by and large, it worked. Scrum-halves did distribute quicker, the game did speed up and there was less shenanigans from half-backs.

Even more recently, referees have been given licence to be far more explicit about when the ball is out of a ruck and when it is not, with benefit of doubt almost always given to the attacking team and to the protection of the half-backs. Some balls these days are quite clearly out from the back foot, yet referees yell almost apoplectically at opposition fringe defenders to get back and leave it alone.

All of this with the intention of protecting half-backs from the ever-increasing, ever-accelerating hulks looking to bury them into the turf in the same way the players in the Asterix in Britain book would. Half-backs get a lot of slack, not undeservedly as their abilities and distributions make the game tick.

So why, for the love of Aaron Smith, why, are the lawmakers not taking a good, hard look at the caterpillar ruck practice and coming up with a quick piece of legislation to wipe it out of the game forever?

Some of the rucks in the Premiership final took a good 15 seconds to be completed from the moment the ball was clearly presented at the back of it, never mind the moment of contact. Half-backs stood around rolling the ball gingerly backwards with their toes. Back three players shivered in the wind and rain waiting for the inevitable high ball.

    The sooner this ludicrous loop hole gets taken out of the game the better. Looks ridiculous. @premrugby @btsportrugby pic.twitter.com/RRqmcUbFxh

    — 𝘾𝙝𝙧𝙞𝙨 𝘾𝙡𝙖𝙧𝙠𝙨𝙤𝙣 (@MrChrisClarkson) November 3, 2019

Granted the conditions were conducive to a kick-oriented game, but we’re estimating that three of the 80 minutes were spent watching one forward after another bind limply onto the backside of the one in front of him while the half-backs attempted a dainty imitation of Cristiano Ronaldo. That’s 3.75% of the game-time, and that might be a kind estimate.

Here are two quickfire common-sense suggestions: a) a half-back (or any player not a part of the ruck) can only touch the ball with his boot once while it is in the ruck, or b) referees should be mandated to call ‘use it’ as soon as the ball is no longer available for the defenders to steal without a counter-ruck.

Neither is difficult to implement, and it would get rid of a really ugly, boring, irritating practice from the game forever.

To be replaced by the Hilton Hotel which has just been given Planning Permission.
https://www.coventrytelegraph.net/news/coventry-news/new-hotel-set-ricoh-arena-19120785

The Rugby Pod

https://play.acast.com/s/therugbypod/episode9-allaboardthewaspsbandwagon-

According to these they start today, with winners being announced through the week.

At 2pm Tomorrow - The Premiership Rugby Top Try-Scorer will be announced. However as it stands Ollie Thorley is on 11 tries, but there are players from both Wasps and Exeter who could easily overtake him in the final (Zach is on 10).

I can understand most of the other awards being given out this week, but if a player in the final gets past the number scored by the recipient ...

Looking at the stats on Premieship Rugby site (https://www.premiershiprugby.com/overview/?FixGuid=19TT8896#statistics) has left me wondering what the term "metres" actually means.

According to the stats YY only made 2 metres, but on at least one occasion the TV compemtatoirs were purring about the 20 metre break he made.

Over the lat couple of years the use of the caterpiller has become more common, but since the post-COVID resumption has become ridiculous.

In a recent Tigers match they had a 5 person version.  I was watching the Edinburgh/Glasgow game last night and players were added to the caterpiller after the ref had called "use it" (and that is another bone of contention - I thought it meant the ball must be used within 5, not 10, seconds).

We discussed it last night but could not see how the laws could be worded to prevent a version of it.

Yesterday I watch Gatland's Chiefs lose in the last minute to a drop goal by Gatlands's son!

Now as I didn't have an emotional tie to either team I was able to watch the match with a more nuanced eye, and the thing that stood out was the more strict refereeing of the breakdown. Particularly someone who was acting as a jackal seemed to be awarded penalty for the tackled player holding on to the ball much quicker than we have seen in the past. Also the ref was more inclined to award penalties against attacking players going off their feet.

If this is what the new WR laws mean I think Willis and Young are going to really come into their own in the future.