Rise in rugby deaths huge concern
The death of Samoan rugby player Faiva Tagatauli is another wakeup call for World Rugby ahead of a global summit on making the game safer to play.
Player safety is set to be the big topic on the agenda of a meeting in March which should spark a shakeup of the sport’s rules.
Tagatauli – who died after a cardiac arrest following a suspected head injury – is believed to be the seventh person to die after a rugby injury since May 2018. The fatalities will put more pressure on World Rugby to potentially modify the tackle rules.
A pilot programme is underway to examine the impact of lowering the tackle line height to the nipple-line, while the French Rugby Federation is calling for tackles above the waist to be banned and for gang tackles to be outlawed.
There is no simple solution, but player safety must become the litmus issue in rugby.
Protecting people who play the game is, ultimately, more important than which nation gets its name on the Webb Ellis Cup as World Cup winner.
The last thing rugby wants is to deter parents from allowing their children to play.
Some rugby apologists might argue millions of people run around rugby fields every weekend with only a small number suffering serious injuries. But seven deaths in nine months are seven too many.
Canadian student Brodie McCarthy, 18, died after suffering a brain injury in a high school game on Prince Edward Island last May. A South African club player died last September after a tackler collided with his neck when he stooped down to pick up a ball. The
website reported that Kyle Barnes, 31, was still conscious when taken to hospital for emergency surgery due to swelling on his brain.
Player safety has become a particularly hot issue in France after the deaths of four young rugby players, aged between 17 and 23.
Adrien Descrhules, 17, was knocked out playing for the Billom under-18 team last May. He was found dead in bed next morning. A preliminary autopsy confirmed the cause of death as a brain haemorrhage caused by a head knock.
Last August, former France youth international Louis Fajfrowski, 21, collapsed in the dressing room after he was hit in the chest while making a tackle in a pre-season game for ProD2 club Aurillac. French medical authorities found the collision was accidental and Fajfrowski had died of a condition called a blow to the chest effectively stops the heart’s rhythm.
Nicolas Chauvin, 18, died after breaking his neck in a game for Stade Francais’ youth team in December 2018.
A 23-year-old student, Nathan Soyeux, died in hospital in Dijon in early January after he felt unwell after making a tackle at a tournament for French engineering schools.
The French Rugby Federation (FFR) has called on World Rugby to ban tackles above the waist and outlaw gang tackles.
FFR president Bernard Laporte said player safety was paramount.
‘‘The FFR and the NRL have therefore proposed to World Rugby an evolution of the rules by lowering the [tackle] line at the level of the belt, prohibiting the two-player tackle and head-to-head [tackles].
‘‘The tackler will have to bend if he comes to tackle, at the risk of being penalised. We have also proposed to World Rugby to experiment with these new rules on our amateur competitions.’’
After Chauvin’s death, World Rugby president Bill Beaumont told that his organisation would ‘‘exhaust all recourse in our unwavering commitment to continue our efforts to reduce the risk of injury’’.
France’s Sports Minister Roxana Maracineanu has said it was ‘‘time the sport adapts its rules to protect younger players from the risks’’. The Samoan rugby union said, in announcing Tagatauli’s tragic death, that it prioritises and recognises the importance of player welfare. It will do so, even more, now. Every rugby nation should be following suit.