Filed under: Dan Cottrell, ELVs, Rugby Coaching, Rugby Team Management | Tags: ELVs, IRB, rugby development
The IRB meet annually to discuss the game. This year’s meeting takes place today and is at the Lensbury Club in London.
The IRB conference is focused on “development”. This list of topics makes for interesting reading:
Mark Egan, the IRB’s Head of Performance and Development is leading the forum.
“This forum will explore and debate a broad range of issues and challenges faced by the Unions on the ground. Ultimately, the participants are the practitioners, the people at the coalface of development; the people who help Rugby grow all over the world.”
“Blueprints will emerge from the debate and some optimal forms of action will be identified. In addition there will be seminars on legal and judicial matters, the Laws of the Game and Playing Regulations, on playing surfaces and clothing, on tournaments and competitions, on training and education, medical as well as development funding.”
Filed under: Dan Cottrell, ELVs, Rugby Refereeing | Tags: ELVs, rugby internationals, rugby referees
I have spent the last 72 hours picking my way through some seemingly obscure rulings in the IRB rugby laws.
At the same time I have watched four internationals and refereed two games of rugby, plus fielded a couple of refereeing questions.
My conclusion is this. We need rugby referees and we need to look after them.
A ”rare beast”? They are rare because of the abuse they receive and thus many are leaving the game. And they are beasts for lots of the connatations you would care to put about them, some good, some because we feel sorry for them and some because they are by no means perfect.
Forget the “bias”, the incompetent, the outmoded and the “non scrum” expert charges. This is why we need to protect the rare beast:
1. The ELVs are different in different parts of the world. How hard is that for an international referee!
2. The interpretations of the ELVs are changing every couple of weeks.
3. The definitions of the breakdown are blurred.
4. The law enforcers are confused, so what hope the players.
5. Too many ignorant people make sweeping remarks when they have poor knowledge and understanding of the game.
6. The error count for players in the game is much bigger than the error count of most referees. The onus is on the referee though should he make even one mistake. Unfair?
Filed under: Dan Cottrell, ELVs, Rugby Refereeing | Tags: ELVs, r.j.p. marks, times online
Here is an article from the Times Online website to have a look at.
THE OTHER SIDE OF THE COIN
REVIEW OF ELV’S (EXPERIMENTAL LAW VARIATIONS)
By R.J.P.Marks
I think it is angry, but has some pertinent points.
http://extras.timesonline.co.uk/elv2.htm
See what you think!
Filed under: Dan Cottrell, ELVs, Rugby Refereeing | Tags: Currie Cup, ELVs, feeding at the scrum, free kick, Lensbury conference, NPC, Paddy O'Brien, rugby kicking, rugby laws
Paddy O’Brien is interviewed on the IRB’s Total Rugby programme today.
Here are some of his answers taken from the IRB website.
For two and a half months the global game has been played under the Experimental Law Variations. The Southern hemisphere was first to experience the ELVs and still include the laws governing sanctions, but what happens when those same players switch to the Northern-style ELVs for the November tests?
Is there a problem on the horizon, or are these issues merely a storm in a tea cup? Questions Total Rugby Radio put to IRB referee manager Paddy O’Brien.
Total Rugby: Looking at some the founding principles behind the ELVs, has the game been ‘given back to the players’?
Paddy O’Brien:”The players would certainly say that it has. On the statistics we’ve had back so far, on 80 to 90 percent of the ELVs the players say they strongly support them, so despite all the myths out there that people don’t like them, the people who play the game, who are at the end of the day the most important people, they’re telling us yes they love them.”
TR: What about making the game more entertaining - there’s a lot of kicking in the North at the moment..
P O’B: “I think there’s a bit of a myth out there that one of our objectives was to make the game more entertaining, which was not the case. That’s up to the players. As for the kicking, the stats show that kicking is no more than it was at Rugby World Cup 2007, in fact it’s down. There’s an average of 51 or 52 kicks in a game and if you go back to the semi finals and final of the World Cup there were 87 kicks per game, so there is a lot of misinformation out there.
“Sure, there is a lot of kicking and that is down to other reasons. Until the referees really get harsh at refereeing people on their feet at the tackle players will not commit to the breakdown and the only way to break defences is by kicking the ball. The fact that there’s a lot of kicking in games at the moment shouldn’t be put down to the ELVs.”
TR: We’ve currently got different Laws being used in the South and the North. Could this not be a problem with IRB World Ranking points and Rugby World Cup seedings potentially at stake?
P O’B: “People get a bit emotional over it but the only difference between the two hemispheres at the moment - and a reminder the NPC and Currie Cup are being played under the 16 ELVs whereas up north it’s 13 - is that instead of being a penalty it’s a free kick as a sanction. That’s the only area.
Filed under: Dan Cottrell, ELVs, Rugby News | Tags: ELVs, lineouts, rucks, rugby league, rugby union, scrums
A little piece of history was made on Saturday. The Bridgend Ravens beat Neath at the Gnoll for the first time since 1982. A Welsh Premiership match with bags of atmosphere, and a sizeable crowd for a wet and windy Saturday afternoon.
Bridgend are perhaps the least financially secure of a league with bridges the gap between the amateur and professional game in Wales. What makes their position even more precarious is news from the Super League. The Celtic Crusaders have won a franchise into Europe’s top level rugby league competition for 2009 and, for the first time, top class rugby league will be played on the fields of Wales.
Wait. Not the first time, because the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff has seen plenty of rugby league finals and one-offs. But now it will be regular games with all the razzmatazz and raw rugby that top league brings.
Filed under: Dan Cottrell, ELVs, Rugby Coaching | Tags: ELVs, Jonathan Kaplan, rugby coaches, rugby kicking, rugby lineouts, rugby mauls, rugby rucks
Rugby coaches around the world are pouring over their tactics and working out whether the new laws have made a significant difference to the game.
In the Northern Hemisphere, two complaints have made most of the headlines: more kicking and inconsistency at the breakdown.
Just a moment…
Inconsistency at the breakdown? That is not talking about an ELV. It is a directive from the IRB for referees to stop “bridging and sealing”. However referees are not controlling this area in the game in the same way. Recently criticism has been aimed at Jonathan Kaplan, the well-respected South African referee in the way he dealt the ruck area in two separate Tri Nations games. “A free for all” said one coach about the last game after he had been very harsh in the previous match. (more…)
Filed under: Dan Cottrell, ELVs, Rugby Coaching, Rugby Training | Tags: 22m, All Blacks, ELVs, Frank Hadden, Graham Henry, Ian McGeechan, lineouts, mauls, Peter De Villiers, Robbie Deans, Scotland, scrums, South Africa, Steve Hansen, Syd Millar, Wales, Warren Gatland
There has been plenty of confusion and misinformation, plus a number of conspiracy theories about the ELVs. The world’s top coaches see the ELVs as here, an opportunity and are working how to deal with them.
Here is what the top coaches are saying at the moment.
Filed under: Dan Cottrell, ELVs, Rugby Refereeing, Rugby Training | Tags: ELVs, lineouts, mauls, pulling down maul, scrums, training programme
They are here and whatever your opinion on them, you are going to have to play with them for the next year at least. There are 13 ELVs to consider and I have already passed on my first thoughts in this blog.
Practically you need to work the ELVs into your training programme, so here are five ways you can approach this.
Filed under: Dan Cottrell, Rugby Coaching, Rugby News, Rugby Training | Tags: All Blacks, ELVs, England, international rugby, IRB, IRB Nations Cup, lineout tips, Ospreys, Pacific Nations Cup, rugby decision-making, rugby kick and chase, rugby training tips, Under 20s World Cup
A bumper rugby weekend on the international front, with matches in every corner of the world. Full tests in the Southern Hemisphere, an A team tournament, Under 20s World Cup, IRB Nations Cup and the Pacific Nations Cup. Chuck in some women’s sevens and you could easily have sat in front of the television all weekend and not ventured outside.
ELVs or not, there was plenty of scintillating rugby on show, and no sign that international games are turgid, or indeed one-sided affairs.
But we don’t just watch the games for “our team”. We want to take something away with us, a little titbit to take onto the training ground for next week.
