Don’t bank on bonus points making big difference

NOW that the Six Nations have grasped the bonus points nettle, as revealed in The Rugby

Paper a fortnight before the season began, a question needs to be asked: Will it make a blind bit of difference?

The short answer is no, it probably won’t. Over most of the last ten years, the odd losing bonus point here and the even odder try bonus point there made next to no difference to the pecking order based on the ancient system of two points for a win, one for a draw and none for a loss.

The assumption that a little extra incentive will encourage more teams to go for broke more often has yet to be proved.

The old school view that the honour of representing your country, or your granny’s country or, in too many cases, where you happen to be living as opposed to where you were born, requires no added incentive surely still holds good.

That the tournament revolves each year round an imbalance of home and away fixtures has been one factor militating against change in the scoring system before now. Another was that had bonus points been in operation in 2001, the Grand Slam champions, France, would have finished second behind Martin Johnson’s England.

Imagine the embarrassment that would have caused. On a smaller scale, the most absurd example of bonus points gone mad happened at Cardiff Arms Park on March 30, 1996.

The Black-and-Blues, as they were known then in the pre-Celtic League days, routed Abertillery 95-25 in the Welsh Heineken League. Despite conceding 15 tries, including five to the Wales wing Steve Ford, Abertillery managed enough of their own to claim a try bonus. And that solitary point saved them from relegation to the second division of the Welsh Heineken League.