ELVs to favour SA scrums
22 Jan 2008
The new law keeping backline defenders five metres beyond the scrum will allow South African franchises significant momentum in the Super 14.
The Stormers played Boland in a warm-up game last Saturday and predictably cruised to a comfortable victory. Of their 12 tries, two were scored from first phase off the scrum with Robbie Diack and Peter Grant utilising the extra space to beat defenders. While defensive lines will be tougher to breach in the Super 14, Stormers assistant coach Gary Gold expects this law to favour a team with a solid scrum.
“I think the Aussie thinking behind this ruling is that it would help them, as it does provide more space,” Gold told keo.co.za. “But teams that can dominate in the scrums will have a big advantage and it will be quite difficult to defend.”
While the Bulls, Cheetahs, Sharks and Lions are all traditionally powerful up front, the Stormers’ scrum is perennially criticised. Despite the 72-10 scoreline in Wellington, the Stormers were asked some serious questions by Andries Human and company. Gold admitted there is still some work to be done up front.
“I think if you had to find a word for our first outing, ‘satisfactory’ would be it. We did reasonably well in the set-pieces and did well to disrupt some of their line-outs. There is room for improvement, but we are still a month away from our first match [against the Bulls]. We need to work a bit harder on our mauls and drives, but after our first outing, I’d say we are pretty much where we want to be.”
The Stormers pack will receive a massive boost when prop Brian Mujati and lock Ross Skeate return from injury. Mujati is arguably the most important acquisition made by Erasmus in the off-season. If the tighthead can replicate the form displayed for the Lions in 2007, the Stormers may finally silence their critics at scrum time.
Gold agreed with Erasmus’s post-match statement concerning the breakdown. The Cavaliers provided a good contest at the tackle point but the Stormers loose forwards showed few signs of rust in this area, World Cup-winner Schalk Burger emerging as the stand out.
“We will always look to improve in what is such a fundamental part of the game, but I agree, it did go well at the breakdown. Xolani Mofu put us under a lot of pressure but I thought our guys handled it well,” Gold said.
By Jon Cardinelli
130 Comments
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22 Jan 2008, 15:51 pm
the whole protea team , except for Amla
22 Jan 2008, 16:04 pm
#98 Geen sokker op di website ni asb.
22 Jan 2008, 16:14 pm
Sherpa Tenzing Norgay and Edmund Hilary were the first people to conclusively reach the summit of Everest.
People kept asking who was first to set foot at the top, Hilary or Norgay. Hunt, the expedition leader, kept insisting they “did it as a team”. Tenzing Norgay insisted, until his death “If it is a shame to be the second man on Mount Everest, then I will have to live with this shame”.
People also asked why there were only photos of Tenzing on the summit. Simple enough reason – Tenzing did not know how to operate the camera, and as Edmund Hilary put it “the top of Mount Everest was no place to start teaching him how to use it”.
“It has been a long road … From a mountain coolie, a bearer of loads, to a wearer of a coat with rows of medals who is carried about in planes and worries about income tax.” – Tenzing Norgay
22 Jan 2008, 16:19 pm
Back to the 5m offside law. Great concept – would have loved to attack around the fringes in the old days with that law in place. Biggest problem, though, is going to be the policing of that imaginary 5m “line.” Very subjective, estimating whether a centre is creeping into the 5m space, whether he is 5m, or 4,5m from the last line of feet. The players also. They couldn’t get it right when the last line of feet was the offside line. How are they going to estimate it now? Short of getting a hawk-eye type of cyclops technology, I can see huge frustration arising out of marginal, yet crucial offside calls.
Mark my words.
22 Jan 2008, 16:27 pm
102. Gaan skree bietjie vir die Welpies hulle het dit nodig.
22 Jan 2008, 17:10 pm
#103
thank you for that
22 Jan 2008, 17:15 pm
Edmund Hilary and Tenzing Norgay remained good friends until Norgay’s death in 1986.
I wonder how Hilary must have felt, constantly seeing his face on the New Zealand five-dollar note.
22 Jan 2008, 17:50 pm
#107
he never liked any of it. Some great stories told at his service. How, he would sit down and sign stacks of $5 notes for charity and the fact he build his own home in Auckland and lived in it for most of his life. His name and address was even in the White pages. A truley modest and approachible man.
truley up there with Mandela.
22 Jan 2008, 18:08 pm
Naand Kerels,
Wat gaan hier aan???
22 Jan 2008, 18:23 pm
Is it just a coincidence that there’s a significant rule change each time after the boks win the RWC, in ’96 there were also a lot of rule changes, the one in particular was to stop a player from kicking the ball dead in his opponent’s in-goal area. The boks did this to good effect in the ’95 final to keep the AB’s pinned in their half for long periods and I agree with this rule change to prevent negative play.
Now the rolling mauls, a Bulls and Sharks weapon, can be collapsed again and there’s the new 5 metre rule to negate the rush defence?
Nah, it’s probably just a coincidence, why would they try and change the rules just to counteract SA teams strengths.
22 Jan 2008, 18:33 pm
Ek sien julle donners is maar stil vanaand…
Dan loop ek maar weer!!!
22 Jan 2008, 18:37 pm
Flyhalves will have less responsibility on defence. The confrontational ‘Honibal type’ that White so eulogised will become less prevalent. I say this because it would appear the rule encourages ball movement to go wider from scrums.
Rucks/mauls and lineouts don’t change though.
22 Jan 2008, 18:39 pm
Perasonally I can’t see that there will be any change in the actual set-scrums. The law states that the backlines have to be 5 metres behind the last feet therefore if the scrum moves, so does the 5 metre line. The Sideline Refs are required to move as the scrum moves north or south.
Rucking is still allowed….but most modern day players have no idea what rucking is because they have it totally confuse with stomping. To ruck a rugby ball means you have to have your body in front of the ball, not on top of it. Rucking is a backwards movement, not an up and down movement.
And hands are not allowed in the ruck, that particular law was left out. The breakdown rule will not change from last year because the reffs continue to allow players to flop over the ball on the ground, just as they allow the ball to be placed under the hookers feet, or behing them if possible. The Reffs are still the greatest blight on our game.
Patrick.
22 Jan 2008, 18:45 pm
#110 thanks Agent Mulder
22 Jan 2008, 20:33 pm
Modawg,
You’re a bit up yourself if you think the new rules were devised to counter-act the SA game. How long has it been since the SA game dominated rugby…….this RWC blip aside…..one helluva long time. You keep on about your Bok pack, but the AB’s in recent years have done yours like a dinner, but your lineout has been a power of strength. The new rules are designed to improve rugby for the spectaors and are nothing at all designed to curb any perceived SA strength in the game,
Patrick.
22 Jan 2008, 20:40 pm
BEST COMMENT BY A FOREIGN PLAYER PLAYING IN THE NH
“But that’s why they brought us here and why they pay us the money they do. We are signed to do our job and if we don’t, they should send us home.”
- PAUL TITO, ex Taranki lock.
22 Jan 2008, 20:40 pm
All this talk about set scrum dominance is pure hogwash. There is ABSOLUTELY NO SCRUM DOMINANCE any more, as the team that puts the ball in (99.99% of the time) gets the ball back because the Reffs allow the ball to be put under the scrummies feet……no contest at all !
Forward dominance now has been transferred to control at the breakdown stage, and the team that gets the most players to the breakdown first, invariably gets the loose ball…..again this is partly stifled because the Reffs still players allow players flopping over, thus killing the loose ball,
Patrick.
22 Jan 2008, 20:42 pm
#115 valid point Patrick
would be interesting to see how strong the kiwi scrums are this year without Hayman there.
22 Jan 2008, 20:48 pm
#117
Patrick, did you watch Heinkie vd Merwe? Woodcock? Hayman? last year?
No Scrum dominence?..yeah, I do know where you are coming come, But that statement does not hold water.
22 Jan 2008, 20:52 pm
I see that the backlin coach from the Bulls has left already. Citing differences … players expected one thing and received another, so cheers!!!
22 Jan 2008, 20:55 pm
#120 WTF?
22 Jan 2008, 21:03 pm
Sounds like the players weren’t 100% happy but that is reading between the lines so Bulls did a deal with him. Ricardo Loubser tipped to take over
22 Jan 2008, 21:09 pm
#115, Patrick x 2 . . .
Both the Sharks and Bulls packs were very strong in the rolling maul area in last year’s S14, and the Boks rush defence has been a thorn in the side of most teams under Jake, do you dispute this?
#117, You obviously didn’t watch the WC semi between OZ and England (were you still in mourning after the quarter finals?), do you think that there might have been a slight amount of scrum dominance in that game? Just asking . . .
#119 Add Sheridan to that list, he was pretty destructive in the WC.
23 Jan 2008, 01:29 am
Ricardo Loubser ?
NO, anyone but him.
23 Jan 2008, 02:55 am
Modawg,
You’re a bit confused on scrum dominance. By dominance I mean one scrum dominating the other, not both sides scrummaging all afternoon whilst the backs look on. If there has been any scrum dominance in the last 3 years it has to be the AB’s. Their from row cleaned out everything put in front of it.
Set scrum results are determined 99.9% of the time by the team putting the ball in. Loose ball dominance has been NZ’s for about 5 years simply because they have been fitter than other teams, amd they have been more mobile this gaining dominance at breakdowns. I repeat, there is no set-piece scrum dominance anymore because the contest is always decided by who has the ball to put in…..very occasionally a mistake is made which has allowed the odd scrum to backfire.
Patrick.
23 Jan 2008, 03:10 am
Modwag,
Since when has a rolling maul been described as a set piece. The rolling maul has never been more than just a ground winner. One side puts the ball in, and it is impossible to get at the ball, so it becomes a permanent fixture at the back of the maul, until such time as the maul collapses, or is dropped in some other way, or occasionally a try is scored from it.
I’m quite sure there will be more thought given to negate the rolling maul, so look forward to a change in a couple of years time. I understand the forwards enjoy the rolling maul even though not many tries have been scored from them,
There was a new rule suggested to allow the maul to be collapsed, thus making it an even contest, but when the chips got down it was decided that collapsing was too dangerous, and we’re back with the rolling maul, just the same as it was last year.
Patrick.
23 Jan 2008, 03:24 am
Modwag,
Sheridan has never been a problem for the AB’s front row…..he has always come off second best, in fact on a couple of occasions he’s been replaced, because he couldn’t cut the mustard against the AB’s from rowers.
The rush defense was Jake’s masterstroke and all NZers will remember the first time we encountered it. It was at Newlands and the Boks got 13 points up in 13 minutes, due entirely to the rush defence. NZ is excellent at playing rugby in the normal style….all it needs to beat NZ is to introduce something they’ve never seen before, and in come the CHOKES !
I don’t think you should get carried away with your RWC win……you didn’t play NZ, and they beat you 2 out of 3 in the Tri-Nations, even though they were only half-fit, and did not have enough matchplay up their sleeves. You’ve got a big shock coming if you think you’re got the AB’s measure on the basis of beating the slomo Poms,
Patrick.
23 Jan 2008, 09:20 am
Patrick x 2,
I’m not getting carried away with the WC win, but the fact is, we won.
Actually they beat the boks 2-0 in the 2007 3N, didn’t they?
Then that begs the question, if they were so friggin brilliant, why didn’t they beat France in the QF, and the “slomo poms” beat France?
23 Jan 2008, 11:07 am
Modwag,
Who said the AB’s were so brilliant…I didn’t
But you can bask in the RWC Glory until such time as you play further tests this season, when hopefully all the contestants come in on an even keel again,
Patrick.
23 Jan 2008, 12:27 pm
Patrick,
I’m looking forward to the 3N tests, it’s gonna be mud ‘n blood ‘n guts and hopefully glory.
Even Oz are going to be a whole lotta fun with Deans at the reins.
A mouth watering prospect . .
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