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The modern ruck' in Rugby League


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17 hours ago, DOGFATHER said:

Alex Walmsley was certainly blown for a knock on in the weekend game. I'd also not be surprised if there were examples in every other game, of these being blown up as knock ons.

Walmsley was not called for a knock-on. It was "loss of control". This illustrates the distinction. The error was after the completion of the tackle.

 

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48 minutes ago, Lowdesert said:

I’ve seen it mate.  Seem to think comments were made on here at the time.  

For me, we can make the game too fast and the PTB is part of the games heritage.  Some don’t think this is an issue but I do.

The new strip rules here are still confusing to players.  You can see it.  They have gone from one extreme (occasionally allowing the ball to be stripped by letting it go in a standing gang tackle in the hope of a penalty) to having it stripped by a well coordinated ‘gang’.  What must amateur coaches think?

Yeah mate I`m not condoning the `roll-ball` I`m just trying to fathom out how something so fundamental to the game could be being ignored. As I went into with great tedium above perhaps it is a tactical move by your RFL to broaden appeal, as an overseas observer there has seemed to be several instances in the last few months of League being compared favourably to union. The RFL may see an opportunity there.

I think over here the balance doesn`t seem to be too bad, even the poorer more conservative teams were throwing more off-loads last week and swinging the ball wide, probably knowing that totally unadventurous play wasn`t going to and hadn`t got them very far in the first 5 rounds.

Without having watched any Super League maybe the RFL should slow down the PTB and have a little more faith in your teams developing more inventive plays to make yardage. But as I said I haven`t watched any, I don`t have Pay, therefore I don`t really know what goes in your comp, only what I read here and I hope I am not making any false assumptions.

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33 minutes ago, Dunbar said:

100% agree.

The game doesn't have to be frantic to be enjoyable.  If anything the ruck today is too fast; I would prefer if the game slowed down a little and players were forced to be a little more inventive with the ball rather than winning a quick ruck to gain an advantage. 

This doesn't mean the players are slowing down.  There is a difference between the athleticism of the players and speed they demonstrate and the speed of the flow of the game... the people managing the game cannot seem to see this distinction though.

Indeed the attack, at times, has become frantic and I also agree with your last lines.  At times I think some of the actions betray the integrity and discipline of the game. I don’t expect to see pureness or perfection but the ruck is a mess we could easily improve.  Was it not agreed to handover possession from an incorrect PTB and some years ago a ‘flop’ was a penalty.

I saw the word ‘interpretation’ mentioned somewhere in the thread.  Personally, I would strive to get rid of this option as much as possible.  Coaches are pushing for too much flexibility and the Refs are going along with it.  

 

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1 hour ago, The Rocket said:

A couple of weekends ago there were 4 or 5 Captains Challenges against knock-on calls made in the first 2 or 3 games of the round, all were successful, I just hope that the CC rule is not going to embolden refs to be even more pedantic in this area of the game

As you have suggested with your detection of a slight change in attitude of on field ref's, you would hope the captains challenge would have the opposite effect.

Ref's are now so used to blowing the whistle every time the ball touches the ground, seeing a few successful challenges when the ball has actually gone backwards and the knock on overturned, may push the onfield ref's to think twice and actually wave play on when a ball goes backwards. 

As someone who opposed the introduction of the captains challenge, I will gladly eat my words if this positive change ensues.

"The history of the world is the history of the triumph of the heartless over the mindless." — Sir Humphrey Appleby.

"If someone doesn't value evidence, what evidence are you going to provide to prove that they should value it? If someone doesn't value logic, what logical argument could you provide to show the importance of logic?" — Sam Harris

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3 hours ago, The Rocket said:

 Having said that despite a couple of glaring omissions there has seemed to be a little more latitude towards balls hitting the deck lately, a couple of times I have even heard the commentators surprised that the game wasn`t pulled up, which is probably an indication of how ingrained it had become. I`m optimistic though because there does seem to be a bit of a change in attitude though.

I`ve noticed a change at NRL level this year too. Less so in the lower grades, which suggests it`s the availability of video technology emboldening refs to play on when in doubt. 

It could be a while before the players stop expecting a whistle. Good example in Storm/Broncos when a Justin Olam tackle on Payne Haas dislodged the ball. It went several yards backwards, but everyone stopped. Storm players were more interested in congratulating Olam than going for the ball - until the ref shouted "play on".

In RL, the commentators are like people in the crowd. Constantly seeing knock-ons and forward passes. When they get officials who agree with all their demands for calls, they subsequently complain that the game was a "stop-start affair".

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3 hours ago, The Rocket said:

As I went into with great tedium above perhaps it is a tactical move by your RFL to broaden appeal, as an overseas observer there has seemed to be several instances in the last few months of League being compared favourably to union. The RFL may see an opportunity there.

Without having watched any Super League maybe the RFL should slow down the PTB and have a little more faith in your teams developing more inventive plays to make yardage. 

As set out on the previous page, I incline more to the cock-up than conspiracy theory on the rollball. Although a belief that it speeds things up may partly explain the RFL`s acquiescence once the decadence was entrenched.

Whatever the motivation, there are two grave ramifications for international RL which even those who don`t share my appraisal of the rollball as grotesquely incompetent, might care to consider.

First, the effect you mention above on the standard of attacking play here. If quick rollballs are the priority, it`s bound to stunt the development of our players. And inhibit our coaches from devising creative attacking shapes and styles. When our rollball blokes go up against some other blokes from a land down under, they`ll find that quick rollballs won`t cut the mustard. And that`s assuming they`re allowed to use them.

Second, is the rollball the RFL`s global plan for the future? i.e. are they expecting the rest of the RL world to eventually fall in line with us? If that doesn`t happen, can we continue to play internationally when our players either can`t or won`t abide by the PTB rules as they are applied in other nations?

When this subject has been addressed on other threads, I`ve kept asking how will the rules be applied at the WC? Is it going to be rollballs for English-based players and PTBs (however imperfect) for everyone else? And thus many games where opposing teams will manifestly be "playing the ball" in markedly different ways.

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5 hours ago, Dunbar said:

As you have suggested with your detection of a slight change in attitude of on field ref's, you would hope the captains challenge would have the opposite effect.

Ref's are now so used to blowing the whistle every time the ball touches the ground, seeing a few successful challenges when the ball has actually gone backwards and the knock on overturned, may push the onfield ref's to think twice and actually wave play on when a ball goes backwards. 

As someone who opposed the introduction of the captains challenge, I will gladly eat my words if this positive change ensues.

I`m pretty sure there was a couple of CCs against knock-on calls in the Tigers/Cowboys match at the weekend, if my memory serves me correct one may have lead to the Tigers retaining the ball at a crucial time.

Look Dunbar I can`t definitively say what is prompting these `play-on` calls, having been influenced by Pedant`s anti-knock on campaign, the romantic in me hopes that the NRL has seen the light and realise that waving play-on makes for the more continuous spectacle they seek. The more vindictive side of my nature thinks that perhaps refs are a little more scared of making gooses of themselves, by being caught out and thus making the same call.

2 hours ago, unapologetic pedant said:

I`ve noticed a change at NRL level this year too. Less so in the lower grades, which suggests it`s the availability of video technology emboldening refs to play on when in doubt. 

It could be a while before the players stop expecting a whistle. Good example in Storm/Broncos when a Justin Olam tackle on Payne Haas dislodged the ball. It went several yards backwards, but everyone stopped. Storm players were more interested in congratulating Olam than going for the ball - until the ref shouted "play on".

In RL, the commentators are like people in the crowd. Constantly seeing knock-ons and forward passes. When they get officials who agree with all their demands for calls, they subsequently complain that the game was a "stop-start affair".

The problem the referee faces though is if they play-on and their call was wrong i.e. it was a knock-on, they will be castigated in the media later. The type of commentator you mention will have a field day, let alone if it leads to something significant a  few plays later when it couldn`t be challenged by the affected side. That would doubly infuriate them. However having said that, I agree we are seeing more play-on calls and it is great.

In a situation like this you`d like to think that touch judges may help refs out, a questionable ball comes out, if not blatantly knocked forward, first instinct by the ref should be `play-on` if the touchies have any more definitive knowledge to the negative, they put their flag up, if not, pull their heads in. The problem with touch judges though is that they seem to fall into two categories, those who can`t wait to show everyone how eagle-eyed they are, real or imagined, and those who are more likely to say to the ref, `don`t look at me, it`s your problem`. But getting back to the original issue, so many dropped balls are just blatant knocked-backs, it would be great if we just started with ignoring those. That would be a significant improvement.

But your right, this is all about learning to officiate in the spirit of the game, something that I`m sure can be taught, certainly up to a point. Hopefully we ae beginning to see that.

 

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44 minutes ago, The Rocket said:

The problem the referee faces though is if they play-on and their call was wrong i.e. it was a knock-on, they will be castigated in the media later. The type of commentator you mention will have a field day, let alone if it leads to something significant a  few plays later when it couldn`t be challenged by the affected side. 

In a nutshell, this must be where the tendency to call rather than play on originated. When a ref 10 metres back, looking from a roughly perpendicular angle, sees the ball spilled, if it`s anywhere near close, he cannot know for certain whether it went forward.

What he does know is that stopping the game for a scrum draws a line under the matter in a way that playing on does not. Intervening is the safer option. And over time this approach becomes habitual and accepted. Which means that giving touch judges the right to call, even if they have a better angle, doesn`t really help.

In RL there seems a greater tolerance for active errors over passive errors. Among the people I used to stand with, when the ref called a legal pass of our team as forward, they weren`t ecstatic, but it didn`t bother them that much. What really fired them up was if the ref didn`t call an opposition pass they were convinced was forward. 

1 hour ago, The Rocket said:

In a situation like this you`d like to think that touch judges may help refs out, a questionable ball comes out, if not blatantly knocked forward, first instinct by the ref should be `play-on` if the touchies have any more definitive knowledge to the negative, they put their flag up, if not, pull their heads in. The problem with touch judges though is that they seem to fall into two categories, those who can`t wait to show everyone how eagle-eyed they are, real or imagined, and those who are more likely to say to the ref, `don`t look at me, it`s your problem`. 

We`ll have to part company on this point. Mainly because all the touch judges I encounter fall into your first category.

There was an object lesson in Monday`s NSW women`s game between Helensburgh and Souths. A Tigers player put a short sixth-tackle grubber in close to the Rabbitohs goal-line. The full-back dropped on the ball, ref shouted play on, then got a call from the touch judge, who from about 30m away thought he`d seen one of those "little bobbles". Tigers took the ball from the scrum and scored the winning try. 

When this happens, it`s hard to know whether the touch judge wants to determine the result, or they just don`t appreciate the significance and cruelty of turning 6 tackles into 12 on the basis of guesswork.

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On 12/04/2021 at 23:32, DOGFATHER said:

Regain feet (b) The tackled player shall without delay regain his feet where he was tackled, lift the ball clear of the ground, face his opponent’s goal line and drop or place the ball on the ground in front of his foremost foot.

How many refs would not give a knock on if the man playing the ball dropped it, rather than placing it on the ground?

When this topic has been addressed on other threads it`s often pointed out that the old-fashioned drop and half-volley PTB would probably be ruled as "loss of control" by modern refs. (Again though, I emphasise, NOT a knock-on. The tackled player cannot knock the ball on after the tackle is complete.)

The drop PTB used to be the standard method. Andy Gregory is the most recent well-known player I can recall using it. The reason it will probably remain in the rulebook is because its removal would have implications for the legality of the drop-kick/field-goal.

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On 11/04/2021 at 22:25, DOGFATHER said:

It is also very different in the Championship to SL, which leaves me even more flummoxed.

Where we see penalties much more frequently for incorrect ptbs, but given in a very arbitrary way. They will be let go for most of the game, then the ref will blow one or two up at random. The ptbs will not improve or change, but they will be ignored for the rest of the game.

I`ve seen no evidence of this. As far as I`m aware, the vile rollball is tolerated at all levels of English RL, including Academy and schoolboys. Thanks to the RFL`s pusillanimous neglect, we will soon have a generation of players for whom playing the ball correctly with the foot would be a novelty. The rollball has been normalised in the UK.

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6 hours ago, David Dockhouse Host said:

As promised we did a follow up and quoted posts from this thread, find the follow up ruck episode here.

 

 

 

Good discussion. You can never stress the need for balance too much in debates like these.

When our administrators change a rule or an interpretation, they are often only conscious of one side of the equation. The other side, and thus the overall effects of the change, has to be played out before their eyes for them to realise the consequences.

The optimum balance in the RL tackle and ruck contest should see superior pre-contact attacking play, which results in the tackled player finding his front, rewarded with a quick PTB. Anything less, should afford defenders varying degrees of scope to slow down the ruck.

In my view, referees across the world generally get this calibration about right. So, I`m happy with the status quo. I don`t understand the beef with so-called "wrestling". For me, the only serious fly in the RL tackle and ruck ointment is the UK rollball.

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22 minutes ago, David Dockhouse Host said:

And now to finish this trilogy here's the final episode on the ruck.......for now 😁 A referees perspective 

 

I thought Ian Smith described the dynamics of the tackle and ruck very well there and it was good to see that a lot of thought is given to how the ruck impacts on the spectators experience. 

What surprised me was that there is essentially a verbal contract between the players and the ref that the ref will call the tackling players to 'move' out of the ruck and they won't be penalised before this. This is very much a feature of refereeing in the Super League/Northern Hemisphere as you don't hear this in the NRL as much.

"The history of the world is the history of the triumph of the heartless over the mindless." — Sir Humphrey Appleby.

"If someone doesn't value evidence, what evidence are you going to provide to prove that they should value it? If someone doesn't value logic, what logical argument could you provide to show the importance of logic?" — Sam Harris

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27 minutes ago, David Dockhouse Host said:

And now to finish this trilogy here's the final episode on the ruck.......for now 😁 A referees perspective 

 

What Ian is saying here reminds me of an NRL.com podcast that husband and wife refereeing duo Gavin and Kasey Badger used to do. They sometimes alluded to the superficial treatment of the tackle and ruck by the media, and the consequent inability of audiences to understand why some rucks are called as infringements, while others are not.

I`m convinced that many commentators and pundits are unfamiliar with the rulebook. Plus, there is a section of the RL constituency that inveterately wallows in the idea of League being simple, as distinct from the supposedly more complex Union. It`s never been true, and never can be true. A ref who seeks to impose a simplistic agenda will ruin the game. Good refereeing has to be nuanced.

Another example is the Flop. -  i.e. a defender only becoming involved in the tackle after it`s complete. If it`s very late, it will be instantly penalised. If it`s less late, close to simultaneous, the ref will shout his name or number, and only if he fails to heed the call and stays in will he be penalised. As with many potential offences, the main criterion is whether an advantage is gained.

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43 minutes ago, Dunbar said:

What surprised me was that there is essentially a verbal contract between the players and the ref that the ref will call the tackling players to 'move' out of the ruck and they won't be penalised before this. This is very much a feature of refereeing in the Super League/Northern Hemisphere as you don't hear this in the NRL as much.

I think Aussie refs regard the "Release" command as sufficient, although I am starting to hear some junior rep officials backing it up with "Move".

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On 08/04/2021 at 11:21, David Dockhouse Host said:

I don't like the standing tackles, calling held early will encourage what I consider a proper tackle. But currently teams are punished for this as they have to roll off, how about allowing a few seconds holding down if it's a good tackle? 

In each of Friday`s 2 NRL games a late offload (Liam Knight for Souths, Oregon Kaufusi for Parra) directly lead to a try. Which illustrates the risks defenders take in not trying to bring the ball-carrier to ground quickly. And the benefits of refs not calling held prematurely. Recently in the NRL, officials are giving the tackle contest more of a chance to develop.

As Ian Smith set out in your interview, good refs tend to balance the time out anyway by allowing tacklers more latitude on the ground if they immediately complete the tackle.

These are tactical choices for defenders contingent on circumstances. Likewise, the reactions of ball-carriers. I understand the attitude to "a proper tackle", but rigidly imposed it will narrow the permutations. The greater variety at the ruck, the greater variety when the ball comes away from the ruck.

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