Scrum needs a change

chris85

Hey would like to see what peoples thoughts on the scrum at the moment. Basically the "crouch, touch, pause, engage" part where it is absolutely annoying for the players as refs are doing this so slowly that numerous fouls going for early engagement.

I see this happening as the pause the ref is giving between the pause and engaged is too long. My interpretation would be each part of the "crouch, touch, pause, engage" be said in a steady flow. There is a pause already in this with the time taken to say the word pause so the ref shouldnt need to have a pause after saying it also.

This may sound pedantic to a lot but having been in the scrum for years in the front row it would annoy the hell out of me. Having the brute force of the scrum being held up waiting for this engage call is bad and is leading to a lot of early engagements on it which arent good for anyone.

A lot of people will come in and say its a safety thing and i understand the "crouch, touch, pause, engage" being for safety but why so long a gap between pause and engage. Its been noted very often on commentary of later as well.

Only a little thing anyways and was wondering on other peoples views!!

thomond2006

Never been in a scrum in my life so this is an unqualified opinion.

Would it be a good idea to get rid of the 'hit'? The packs could bind together first and then wait for the ref's call to push.

A lot of the resets seem to be down to props not binding correctly and messing up at the hit.

chris85

thomond2006 wrote: »

Never been in a scrum in my life so this is an unqualified opinion.

Would it be a good idea to get rid of the 'hit'? The packs could bind together first and then wait for the ref's call to push.

A lot of the resets seem to be down to props not binding correctly and messing up at the hit.

I think getting rid of the hit would go back to the days of the 80's where the scrums just formed and then pushed and no real excitement. Also the force of the scrum would be less for the sides as less momentum carried from impact. I do like the scrum as it is but thing the ref calls just need to be changed.

The props issues is a tough one. Never played prop and dont know much about the binding as such. The binding is a real hard thing to get right but props are trying to get the right bind as soon as they hit while trying the concentrate on when engage will be called. Something has to give.

I just feel its too big of a pause to engage and not helping with 16 players waiting and wanting this engage call but ref pausing too long.

Sandwlch

In the SA game, neither scrum paused for the 'pause'. They were already engaged as he said 'engage'. But he seemed OK with it not happening as he was calling it. Understand how it leads to a lot of player confusion. In theory it is OK but the inconsistent application is making a mess of it.

chris85

Sandwlch wrote: »

In the SA game, neither scrum paused for the 'pause'. They were already engaged as he said 'engage'. But he seemed OK with it not happening as he was calling it. Understand how it leads to a lot of player confusion. In theory it is OK but the inconsistent application is making a mess of it.

yeah i agree its more the inconsistent application thats causing the issues but its something that been going on a while and seems to cause a lot of confusion with players. They have enough to do there apart from think of this.

PhatPiggins

thomond2006 wrote: »

Never been in a scrum in my life so this is an unqualified opinion.

Would it be a good idea to get rid of the 'hit'? The packs could bind together first and then wait for the ref's call to push.

A lot of the resets seem to be down to props not binding correctly and messing up at the hit.

Maybe we could get rid of the flankers and play 13 a side, don't need lineouts either as they just waste time. Maybe give each team 5 goes at scoring before handing over possession........... sound familiar?

The hit is the best part of the scrum and is technically the hardest part for a player to get right, its over in a second and you can't compensate for a bad one.

I might be slightly biased though as I pray for rain before matches and a glut of scrums.

WallyGUFC

The whole "crouch touch pause engage" thing isn't the problem. As was said it's the inconsistency. I mean some refs really do pull the piss with the length of time between pause and engage.

pmct

As some currently playing in the front row it is really really annoying the biggest problem is that their is no second chance in the past most refs would call for a reset only after many early engages would free kicks be given now the refs are giving free kicks after only one our trainer now says to let the other team engage first and just hold and wait

corny

Wouldn't be certain on this but isn't the inconsistency deliberate. I mean if you can pre-empt when the hit is going to occur you're effectively making the whole process meaningless. I thought the point of all this 'crouch, touch, pause, engage' stuff was to limit the damage at the collision. ie de-power the hit but the overall scrum. Like i said i'd be far from certain of that though just my understanding of it.

Downtime

From the IRB conference:

The scrum continues to be a major focus area and the IRB High Performance Referees were reminded of their obligation to take charge of the scrum sequence and to ensure strict and consistent application of all aspects of scrum law.

"The 2010 Tri Nations saw a 40% decrease in the number of scrum resets compared to the 2010 June Tier 1 Tests, so this area of the game is improving," added O'Brien.

"The coaches have all expressed their support of the referee leading the crouch, touch, pause, engage scrum sequence and sanctioning players who fail to follow the calling of the engagement procedure, particularly early engagement.

"The message to the referees is clear. We require greater consistency at the elite level and compliance is critical in this key area of the game."

There are four clear instructions and some front rows don't even comply with the touch. There should be about a 2 second pause at pause and engage and both front rows should be steady before engage. I think it really has taken the amount of resets down to a minimum and this can only be positive. Interesting to note that the pause has been deemed too short at some levels. Of course you will get inconsistency as there are different level of referees out there as well as different levels of players. It is probably more consistent at the higher J1 and 1st XV level.

boredatwork82

I play prop. It took me a whole 15 mins to get use to the new calls. Puts more emphasis on 8 working together, getting timing right, 2nds holding you back and not pushing. If my second row as much as breaths on me, i will go forward, and he'll get mouthful. But we have gotten it right and are getting the nudge and solid scrum on all our opposition .
It shouldn't be any issue really. The teams giving away the penalty are going early to try and get a better hit on. Keep penalising them. If they have to try and break the rules to get better ball they need to train harder.

The only recommendation I would make would be to change the word from "engage" to a one sylabyl word like "hit".
Read about in this months Rugby World.
Makes sense.
Do you hit when the ref starts to say engage or when he has finished saying engage?

Hit is a quicker one sylabyl word. Makes a little bit of sense.

chupacabra

Just get rid of the pause altogether and make it a strict 3 second call. Crouch, Touch, Engage. 3 seconds.

toomevara

chupacabra wrote: »

Just get rid of the pause altogether and make it a strict 3 second call. Crouch, Touch, Engage. 3 seconds.

+1. The four step call is a nightmare, its counter intuitive and simply doesn't work. I played in the front row before the current laws and I cant imagine trying to hold off the engage for that long.... All academic anyway the scrum as we know it will have ceased to exist in RU in 5/6 years. Its in the sights of the elf'n'safety brigade and all I can see is further de-fanging and increasing irrelevance. All to no avail to boot as the fact is, the majority of serious injuries in rugby are sustained in the tackle...

Bogsnorkler

chupacabra wrote: »

Just get rid of the pause altogether and make it a strict 3 second call. Crouch, Touch, Engage. 3 seconds.

Yes. the refs "pause between crouch, touch, Pause, and engage anyway. The pause call just means it goes crouch (pause), touch (pause), pause (pause), engage.

Nonsense

chimchimney

Downtime wrote: »

There are four clear instructions and some front rows don't even comply with the touch. There should be about a 2 second pause at pause and engage and both front rows should be steady before engage. I think it really has taken the amount of resets down to a minimum and this can only be positive. Interesting to note that the pause has been deemed too short at some levels. Of course you will get inconsistency as there are different level of referees out there as well as different levels of players. It is probably more consistent at the higher J1 and 1st XV level.

as a winger i dont know much about what goes on in the scrum, but am curious....how does the 2 second pause lead to less resets?

who the fug

Take the scrum out of the game, then the game is dead in my arrogant opinion

Daragh86

I'm a prop and I've absolutely no problems with the call at the general level I'm playing, although I dropped down a couple levels for a game coming back from injury and I wasn't at all happy with the call. But with all referee calls around the park there is going to be different skill levels of refs at different levels of rugby, not just bad calls in the scrums.

At AIL level all refs so far have been consistant. As a prop I have no problem with having to wait an extra 2/3 seconds to engage. I actually prefer the longer calls because it gives me a couple of seconds more to get into that comfortable position and get set. By the time your crouched it may only be another 4/5 seconds before your engaged and if a prop can't hold themselves in the crouched position for 4/5 seconds then they have a lot more to worry about than the call.

I think a lot of people are getting a bit too excited about this and everyone is jumping on the bandwagon regardless of front row experience/knowledge. The problem isn't with the call, it's a problem with the refs at different levels.

The hit most definately shouldn't be taken out of a scrum because that is what a scrum is based on. Get a good hit on and win that hit then more than likely you'll dominate that scrum. As someone said previsouly binding isn't as important as people sometimes make out, I think a lot of refs pull players up on this because it's probably the extent of their scrummaging knowledge. Rarly will a bind alone bring a scrum down.

chris85

Bogsnorkler wrote: »

Yes. the refs "pause between crouch, touch, Pause, and engage anyway. The pause call just means it goes crouch (pause), touch (pause), pause (pause), engage.

Nonsense

Exactly the pause being sais should be the pause but the time lag waiting for engage seems bit inconsistent.

LeinsterDub

It's all about the bind for me and 2 simple steps would improve this greatly

1. Why can't the touch judge or other official be on the side the ref isn't on to monitor the binds?
2. All these skins tight jerseys are nearly impossible to get hold of. Make props ware loose fitting jerseys or take it a step further and mandate a "handle" on the back of props jerseys

LeinsterDub

Daragh86 wrote: »

Rarly will a bind alone bring a scrum down.

True enough but a bad bind allows for all lots of front row messing that goes on.

If you bind low rather than high you can twist and pull your opposition number, go low into the chest or drill in. If you've bound right unless you got so freaky long arms your ability to do most of the front row "black arts" is greatly limited

Stev_o

Scrums at the highest level are beyond a mess. There are very few scrums that actually end up being legal between obvious boring, non existent binds, hand on the floor then bind or early engagement.

Pause needs to be removed completely. Everyone is jumping the call and thus you see a lot of those fronts rows driving downswards as they **** up the call. It should be imo crouch touch *Ref pauses* engage/hit.

LeinsterDub

Stev_o wrote: »

Scrums at the highest level are beyond a mess. There are very few scrums that actually end up being legal between obvious boring, non existent binds, hand on the floor then bind or early engagement.

Pause needs to be removed completely. Everyone is jumping the call and thus you see a lot of those fronts rows driving downswards as they **** up the call. It should be imo crouch touch *Ref pauses* engage/hit.

Removing the pause will do nothing for the problems you highlight with the possible exception of early engagement.

Stev_o

LeinsterDub wrote: »

Removing the pause will do nothing for the problems you highlight with the possible exception of early engagement.

Removing the pause basically brings back to the old system that was in place. The fact that international refs make such long winded pauses raises the question of why it's there in the first place when it's hampering the scrum.

Mean the only reason i can understand for the long pause is Ref's trying to bait out a team for a early engagement but that goes completely against what a ref is supposed to be there for.

The end of the day is that the scrum is a reset. It's how we start the game. If you can get that to function properly then you have some very big underlying problems.

Daragh86

This thread is about the scrum call. If we were to talk about the entire scrum and the reffing of it we could make a list as long as my arm of laws broken in each and every scrum. I agree that illegal binding can give a prop a definate advantage, although at least at loosehead a quick long arm bind will negate any sort of messing the tighthead tries - but this isn't the problem with the scrums at the moment. I think the scrums should be reffed better but this will only lead to more penalties and the skinny pretty boys in the backs having a piss and a moan about it so I say let the front rows sort out the small things themselves and the ref should get up to speed and implement the new slower call - obviously boring in, hitting the deck or stuff of the like should be pulled up by the ref.

The only problem with scrums is the ref, simple.

Downtime

Daragh86 wrote: »

The only problem with scrums is the ref, simple.

Typical blame the ref. I guess it is the easy way out. What about the players who are unable to heed simple instruction?

How is it the refs? They are being directed from above on engagement. No matter what you say the scrum is much better this year than it was - less collapses, fairer contest, more turnovers than last season. All down to a slower engagement.

BTW Collapses are resets are down nearly 50% on last season. Good news unless you enjoy continuous resets.

Daragh86

Downtime wrote: »

Typical blame the ref. I guess it is the easy way out. What about the players who are unable to heed simple instruction?

How is it the refs? They are being directed from above on engagement. No matter what you say the scrum is much better this year than it was - less collapses, fairer contest, more turnovers than last season. All down to a slower engagement.

BTW Collapses are resets are down nearly 50% on last season. Good news unless you enjoy continuous resets.

If you read my posts I said I've no problems with the call and I've no problem how the refs call it (it's timing). But if a front rower decides to jump that call (which is what people are saying is happening) then it is the refs fault if he doesn't pull him up on it. I'm not out to get refs, they have a difficult enough time as it is but it is a very simple call to make if someone jumps the gun. As a prop I want the ref to pull front rowers up on jumping the call and if not I'll start jumping the call cause I'm not letting the opposition get the jump on me - it's only cheating if your caught.

Down off that high horse...