Adapted women’s rugby is a skilful lesson to men’s game
The history of scientific discoveries is littered with happy accidents. Perhaps most famously, Sir Alexander Fleming discovered penicillin after accidentally contaminating a Petri dish in his laboratory before going on a two-week holiday. When he returned, a mould had grown that would go on to save millions of lives.
You can add plastic, gunpowder, anaesthesia and cornflakes to the list of breakthroughs that came about more through luck than judgment. Which brings us to the future of rugby union and the adapted laws being applied in the Allianz Premier 15s, the top flight of club women’s rugby union.
They were born of necessity to minimise Covid-19 transition between players. These included 35-minute halves and fewer scrums to mitigate face-to-face contact. Like the similar proposed adapted laws for the men’s and women’s community game, these were seen as a short-term inconvenience necessary to restart matches.
But like that contaminated Petri dish, a new culture has fermented inside the women’s division. Last weekend, we were treated to a smorgasbord of skill, from Keith Earls’ strike move against England to Andy Uren’s try for Bristol against Northampton. However, for my money, the greatest piece of individual brilliance came from Wasps’ Maud Muir against Loughborough Lightning on Saturday.
Fielding a kick-off over her head, Muir stiff-arms the first would-be tackler like an NFL running back and tears off down the sideline before offloading out of a tackle. It is a combination of all that makes rugby union so thrilling, using physicality, skill and ambition. The best part: Muir is a prop.
According to Giselle Mather, the Wasps director of rugby, it was no coincidence that Muir brought out her party tricks since the adapted laws came in. “That 10 seconds of play was breathtaking,” Mather said. “The product on the field has definitely advanced this year. There is more ball-in-play time in that 70 minutes than there was in the 80 minutes of the normal laws. We only had two knock-ons in the whole game against Exeter two weeks ago and four this week.
“Our handling is getting better and I believe this is a direct result of these new laws because we have to play more, we have to handle more and the girls are getting much better at dealing with that under pressure.”
Under the adapted laws, scrums are awarded if you are held up over the try-line, the ball goes dead, a line-out is not straight or if the ball-carrier is held up in a choke tackle. Forward passes, however, will result in a free-kick, meaning there are far fewer set-pieces in the game. Yet, before the front-row union start complaining, Wasps captain Kate Alder says fewer scrums have conversely increased their importance. “I feel there is more light on scrums because they are rarer; it is this golden moment where your front row get a chance to do what they do best,” Alder said. “Our scrum ripped it apart on Saturday because you are not having 15 scrums a game.”
For Mather, one of the smartest minds in the game, the results of the experiment should act as an epiphany for the lawmakers, not just for the women’s game but for the men’s as well. At a time when private equity is pouring money into the sport, rugby union desperately needs to be able to market itself beyond its traditional base. As Mather points out, far too many of the men’s Six Nations matches were dominated by discussions of refereeing performances rather than the action on the field. This can be rugby union’s happy accident.
“Our laws of the game need to be seriously looked at by World Rugby to make it less complicated, so when you are watching a game the fans aren’t going, ‘What is that for?’” said Mather. “And the younger generation aren’t going, ‘I don’t understand, a minute ago he was off his feet and I think he has done the same thing and no whistle has gone.’
“The younger generation aren’t watching the game because it is too slow, things aren’t clear enough for them and we need to look at that.”