northern hemiphere referees?? WTF!

[antiussentiment]

i've been watching the hieneken cup and the french top 14. i've also been trying to teach a friend how the tackle and rucks/mauls work. those of you who've seen what i'm talking about will know this is probably impossible with a french referee and improbable with any of the others up there.

obviously the neighbours got pissed off and stole the gate and being "on your feet" may only mean you can do metric to imperial conversions.

so i've told her "just enjoy the punching and kicking". as it is not even making sense to me.

are we going to see southern hemisphere referees become like this?

[MI5_Dog]

I was watching the top 14 the other day and thinking the same thing. Every maul seemed to become a game of 'how many can we pile on top'. There was more diving going on than in a french soccer match.

[antiussentiment]

in one game the comments man said.

"i think the rule here is. don't worry about the gate, come in anyway you want and bring the whole gang!" ~laughs~

i hope this is not a sign of refereeing to come on a world wide scale.

[jazza93]

French Rugby is awsome. Just a different sort of game with much more kicking than s14. The amount of turnovers that would happen in a game without letting them break half the rules would be close to 0 .

[welshrugbyfan]

Sounds like rugby from the 70's again.

Which is what we need.

The first two minutes are 'that' try but this video does show a small example of how the game used to just simply be played. To me it was and still should be how the game was meant to be played. There's a scrum in there for example that just does it's job, its so bloody technical now. Somewhere along the line we have lost our way.

[Burgs]

Can't watch the footage here though can imagine it, used to love those old scrums where the two packs would just sort of morph into one big lump of testosterone and the ball would spit out, along with the odd Hookers ear or Locks finger...

[antiussentiment]

WONDERFUL CLIP!

though i can't imagine 2 front rows leaning on each other quietly like that now while they wait for the half to feed the ball.

the interesting thing is, they did not show any rucks and only one (sort of) maul in the highlights clip. this is because (if my memory serves me right) in those days most tackles resulted in a dead ball followed by a scrum?

to quasi quote a lion;
"i love scrums, but i could not eat a whole game of them"
~laughs~

once again.. great clip and thanks for posting it.

[welshrugbyfan]

Hard to find footage of rucks and mauls on the net. The ref was just a spectator who was allowed on the field. Not like todays refs who spoil a good game.

There's a ruck here at the 35 second or so mark, that's probably long enough that most on this site would want to watch anyway.

Just a big pile and and grab the ball, great days when rucking was allowed. Stops the not rolling away issue.

[antiussentiment]

ok... i've worked it out. if you have very good side burns, you can not be tackled.. so this sort of running back line rugby works a treat. the force just needs to employ a good barber in the training staff.

this does not explain why poor scotty favor did not have a better time with the force... :-s