No points for a ‘try’ ...and a kick on the shins is fair game
Welcome to the anything-goes rules of first Scotland-England match 149 years ago today
THE Calcutta Cup clash between Scotland and England in the Six Nations last month was, by common consent, one of the worst Test matches in living memory.
In the howling gales and biblical rain of Storm Ciara, it was a match so ugly it could have cracked mirrors.
Tasked with battering out 1,000 words on a tight deadline for the tea-time kick-off, your Sportsmail correspondent was considering a change of career at half-time.
England led 3-0 as the teams traipsed up the tunnel — bringing to an end what had been the lowest-scoring first half in the Calcutta Cup since 1966.
Not exactly a game filled with drama and talking points, the prospect of providing 1,000 words was beginning to feel like writing
War and Peace.
For the 67,000 tortured souls inside Murrayfield unfortunate enough to have witnessed it, a game which England eventually won 13-6 felt instantly forgettable.
How different the picture now looks some six weeks down the line. Starved of any live sport in these bizarre times of isolation, we would all love to be able to go and watch that game again.
Today, March 27, marks the 149th anniversary of the first-ever Test match in international rugby, staged between Scotland and England in 1871.
There were 4,000 fans who each paid a shilling for the privilege of watching the encounter between the teams at Raeburn Place in Edinburgh.
It seems a modest fee now, given that most of us would frankly pay an arm and a leg just to have a game — any old game — to watch in the current state of lockdown.
It was the day on which a great sporting rivalry began — and, as luck would have it, the contest was effectively forged in the fires of a newspaper. In December 1870, The
Scotsman published a letter inviting footballers from England to participate in a match under ‘Rugby Rules’.
The letter also appeared in the pages of Bell’s Life, a magazine published in London, and the challenge was duly accepted — not by the English FA, but by Blackheath, one of London’s oldest clubs.
Scotland staged trials for the match and legend has it that certain players were selected on little more than the fact they enjoyed a whisky or two. Protocol, gents…
They eventually settled on a team of 20, with representatives of West of Scotland FC, Edinburgh Academicals, Merchistonian, Glasgow Accies and St Salvator (St Andrews).
Their intention was ‘to test what Scotland can do against an English team’.
The letter continued: ‘We, as representing the football interests, hereby challenge any team selected from the whole of England, to play us a match, twenty-a-side, rugby rules, either in Edinburgh or Glasgow.’
With Scotland wearing brown jerseys adorned by a thistle, and England all white with the red rose, the teams engaged in battle.
The rules of the game were totally different to the modern day and, at times, it was actually a case of make it up as you go along. There was considerable disparity between the set of rules that both teams normally played under, with ‘hacking’ the main bone of contention.
Hacking was effectively the act of bringing the ball-carrier to the ground by kicking their shins.
With no VAR around in those days, a good old two-footed lunge was deemed perfectly legitimate until the RFU outlawed it in one of their first meetings in 1871.
Hacking would also allow players to collapse a scrum in double-quick time and, although it had been the RFU who banned it, it was actually the English players who persisted with it as a tactic. Referee Hely Hutchinson Almond warned both captains that he would abandon the game, played over two halves of 50 minutes, if hacking became in any way prevalent.
The scoring rules were different, but they give us an indication over why certain terms have endured to the current day.
A team was not awarded any points for grounding the ball over the line. Instead, they would only earn a ‘try at goal’.
It was the numbers of goals, irrespective of tries, that would ultimately determine the winner of the match.
Angus Buchanan scored the first try for Scotland and, by extension, the first-ever try in international rugby.
But the English were furious and argued it should not have stood. The manner in which the Scotland scrum had driven them over the line was illegal in the English laws of the game.
Tellingly, though, referee Almond was a Scot and he later said: ‘Let me make a confession: I do not know whether the decision which gave Scotland the try from which the winning goal was kicked was correct in fact.
‘When an umpire is in doubt, I think he is justified in deciding against the side which makes the most noise.
‘They (England) are probably in the wrong.’
The try was converted by Scotland’s William Cross and it ended up being the matchwinning contribution.
Both teams scored one more try apiece; Scotland with two tries to England’s one, but England’s was not converted.
The final score read: Scotland two tries and one goal, England one try only. The Calcutta Cup was subsequently formed in 1879 and the two teams have been keeping us royally entertained ever since.
Even if it didn’t feel like it just a few weeks ago...
A good old two-footed lunge was deemed legitimate