Things That Brought About Change in Rugby League

[theshed]

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This guy says

If he was a sleazy toxic businessman in a movie you’d recast him for being too over the top.

He looks like perfect blend of Mr Burns and Fat Tony.

 

[BroncsFan]

don't let any current RL journo hear that, as far as they are all concerned it was Slater that reinvented fullback play by adding ball playing to the mix. Makes my blood boil every time I hear it.

And disregarding that he was a horrendous ball playing fullback at the start of his career... even across his entire career he was nowhere near Lockyer's level back when he played fullback at the start of his career.

 

[Organix]

Things that brought about change:

- Jamie Soward kicking 60-70m for the ball to go dead resulted in the 7-tackle 20m restart. This completely alters the momentum of the game when an attacking kick goes dead in goal, for example. This is, for me, a huge change that really never was critically recognised.
- Melbourne's wrestle. Nuff said.
- The NFL players suing the NFL for concussions and life-changing brain injuries.
- Uncontested scrums. FFS.
- 6-agains.
- Technological advances in things like the Bunker, comms for the ref, etc.
- The decline of the touch judge. Not really sure what happened here, but for some reason the touch judge seems to no longer rule on much at all.
- The introduction of Brisbane into the comp and certainly the introduction of Melbourne.

Above all of these things, and probably what caused all of these things to occur is the commercialisation of Rugby League as an entertainment product, rather than a competitive sport. The focus being placed on getting more engagement, rather than the contest itself.

 

[Dash]

Qld winning two origin series via a draw. Gave us the last two decades of field goal shootouts.

 

[BroncsFan]

@Big Pete you'll have to add Nicho vs dogs to the top of your head for touched field goals

 

[Morkel]

Things that brought about change:

- Jamie Soward kicking 60-70m for the ball to go dead resulted in the 7-tackle 20m restart. This completely alters the momentum of the game when an attacking kick goes dead in goal, for example. This is, for me, a huge change that really never was critically recognised.
- Melbourne's wrestle. Nuff said.
- The NFL players suing the NFL for concussions and life-changing brain injuries.
- Uncontested scrums. FFS.
- 6-agains.
- Technological advances in things like the Bunker, comms for the ref, etc.
- The decline of the touch judge. Not really sure what happened here, but for some reason the touch judge seems to no longer rule on much at all.
- The introduction of Brisbane into the comp and certainly the introduction of Melbourne.

Above all of these things, and probably what caused all of these things to occur is the commercialisation of Rugby League as an entertainment product, rather than a competitive sport. The focus being placed on getting more engagement, rather than the contest itself.

IIRC the 7-tackle restart was brought in because of Slater. Teams nullified him by kicking dead to reduce his impact, but the NRL didn't like that (because entertainment) so they penalised the tactic. In fairness, they have made a lot of rules to keep the ball in play as much as possible, but would it have been such a big deal if it was any other team/player?

Also a notable change to keep the ball in play was the 6-again. It was brought in to counter the Roosters' cynical tactic of deliberately giving away penalties any time their line was stretched.

Then the Panthers decided to be off-side at the start of defensive sets to pin the opposition, an extra tackle meant nothing if the opposition can't even make 5m per run. So the NRL countered by making it a genuine (kick for touch) penalty if it's in the attacking team's half. Of course instead of following through the NRL just decided to overook their off-sides or leaving early.

 

[winslow_wong]

Was it when Ben teo absolutely obliterated Matt Groat that the shoulder charge started to be outlawed?

 

[LittleDavey]

IIRC the 7-tackle restart was brought in because of Slater. Teams nullified him by kicking dead to reduce his impact, but the NRL didn't like that (because entertainment) so they penalised the tactic. In fairness, they have made a lot of rules to keep the ball in play as much as possible, but would it have been such a big deal if it was any other team/player?

Also a notable change to keep the ball in play was the 6-again. It was brought in to counter the Roosters' cynical tactic of deliberately giving away penalties any time their line was stretched.

Then the Panthers decided to be off-side at the start of defensive sets to pin the opposition, an extra tackle meant nothing if the opposition can't even make 5m per run. So the NRL countered by making it a genuine (kick for touch) penalty if it's in the attacking team's half. Of course instead of following through the NRL just decided to overook their off-sides or leaving early.

I'd say this year's interpretation of "both feet behind the line" for the defence is also an attempt to give the attacking team a bit more space. The 10m is policed pretty terribly anyway though at the moment so short of going back to 2x referees - or having a touchie marking the defensive line as well and having eyes up the line - these little tweaks don't do much to help.

 

[Renegade]

Was it when Ben teo absolutely obliterated Matt Groat that the shoulder charge started to be outlawed?

that and Inglis nearly killing Dean Young

 

[Morkel]

I'd say this year's interpretation of "both feet behind the line" for the defence is also an attempt to give the attacking team a bit more space. The 10m is policed pretty terribly anyway though at the moment so short of going back to 2x referees - or having a touchie marking the defensive line as well and having eyes up the line - these little tweaks don't do much to help.

And instead of living off-side, they just leave early. They only ping it if one or two players leave before the others. Bit if the whole line goes early the ref lets it go. The rule is the line must hold until the ball "clears the ruck". As it's often messy, the indicator for this is when the player touches it with their foot. But that was from the day where you had to plant the ball (rolling it would be considered losing control), and roll it back with the foot. You never see that these days, most players just roll it and make a vague flick of the foot to signify an attempt to play at it with the foot. Or if you're a hyphen player (JWH, NAS, JFH), don't even bother with the foot, the ref lets it go. So the "touch it with the foot" trigger is gone. So defensive lines start moving when the player begins to move the ball-carrying arm towards the ground, which is vague as ****, and because you can' baulk, even if there is a slight movement of the arm, but not an immediate PTB, the ref calls "baulking" and the defence gets a one second head start.

It's a clusterfuck, and I reckon half of the leaving-early, tunnel-ball, lottery that is the ruck would be negated if they enforced the original play-the-ball technique.

 

[Organix]

And instead of living off-side, they just leave early. They only ping it if one or two players leave before the others. Bit if the whole line goes early the ref lets it go. The rule is the line must hold until the ball "clears the ruck". As it's often messy, the indicator for this is when the player touches it with their foot. But that was from the day where you had to plant the ball (rolling it would be considered losing control), and roll it back with the foot. You never see that these days, most players just roll it and make a vague flick of the foot to signify an attempt to play at it with the foot. Or if you're a hyphen player (JWH, NAS, JFH), don't even bother with the foot, the ref lets it go. So the "touch it with the foot" trigger is gone. So defensive lines start moving when the player begins to move the ball-carrying arm towards the ground, which is vague as ****, and because you can' baulk, even if there is a slight movement of the arm, but not an immediate PTB, the ref calls "baulking" and the defence gets a one second head start.

It's a clusterfuck, and I reckon half of the leaving-early, tunnel-ball, lottery that is the ruck would be negated if they enforced the original play-the-ball technique.

Absolutely. The rules were already there, but then they tweak and tweak them until they screw them up completely.

IIRC the 7-tackle restart was brought in because of Slater. Teams nullified him by kicking dead to reduce his impact, but the NRL didn't like that (because entertainment) so they penalised the tactic. In fairness, they have made a lot of rules to keep the ball in play as much as possible, but would it have been such a big deal if it was any other team/player?

Also a notable change to keep the ball in play was the 6-again. It was brought in to counter the Roosters' cynical tactic of deliberately giving away penalties any time their line was stretched.

Then the Panthers decided to be off-side at the start of defensive sets to pin the opposition, an extra tackle meant nothing if the opposition can't even make 5m per run. So the NRL countered by making it a genuine (kick for touch) penalty if it's in the attacking team's half. Of course instead of following through the NRL just decided to overook their off-sides or leaving early.

Ah, yeah, 6 of one and half a dozen of the other. Soward was in my memory the one blasting it from his 40m line dead to basically give his team a set defensive line at the 30. He did it against us. I just didn't watch many Storm games, so maybe it was a Slater thing, but I saw it as a Soward thing because he did it almost every single time he could. If other guys saw that as tactically savvy, then it could have gone from there.

 

[Morkel]

Absolutely. The rules were already there, but then they tweak and tweak them until they screw them up completely.

Ah, yeah, 6 of one and half a dozen of the other. Soward was in my memory the one blasting it from his 40m line dead to basically give his team a set defensive line at the 30. He did it against us. I just didn't watch many Storm games, so maybe it was a Slater thing, but I saw it as a Soward thing because he did it almost every single time he could. If other guys saw that as tactically savvy, then it could have gone from there.

I think you're right, the two were intertwined, and Bennett playing to his team's strengths in order to tactically take Slater's kick returns out of the game would have had the NRL in crisis mode.

 

[Big Pete]

I don't recall kicking it over the dead-ball line on the full being that prevalent in the game when it was outlawed.

I remember the Dragons did it in the opening game of 2010 against the Eels. I also vaguely remember the Titans doing it, but it wasn't this farcical thing like that Milford pass into Cameron Smith ended up being.

The 7 tackle set always seemed like a massive overreaction for a problem that wasn't there.

 

[BroncsFan]

I don't recall kicking it over the dead-ball line on the full being that prevalent in the game when it was outlawed.

I remember the Dragons did it in the opening game of 2010 against the Eels. I also vaguely remember the Titans doing it, but it wasn't this farcical thing like that Milford pass into Cameron Smith ended up being.

The 7 tackle set always seemed like a massive overreaction for a problem that wasn't there.

Yeah this was my recollection as well.

Can recall it happened like once or twice against Slater... and it wasn't really a sustained 80mins effort to do it... more like it happening 3-5 times in a game.

The pundits blew up thinking it would be the new meta to take away Slater's kick returns ... it wasn't even about fullbacks across the league, it was basically just Slater and off a couple kicks.

Was it that much of an issue?

There probably weren't even that many kickers in the league to be punting it dead from beyond the 50m to make it an option across the league.

I don't mind a 7 tackle set off a bad kick, but I absolutely loathe it off an error in the ingoal.

The defending team shouldn't be rewarded for the attacking team making an error in a try scoring situation... it's rewarding failure for letting them get to that situation in the first place.

 

[Organix]

Yeah this was my recollection as well.

Can recall it happened like once or twice against Slater... and it wasn't really a sustained 80mins effort to do it... more like it happening 3-5 times in a game.

The pundits blew up thinking it would be the new meta to take away Slater's kick returns ... it wasn't even about fullbacks across the league, it was basically just Slater and off a couple kicks.

Was it that much of an issue?

There probably weren't even that many kickers in the league to be punting it dead from beyond the 50m to make it an option across the league.

I don't mind a 7 tackle set off a bad kick, but I absolutely loathe it off an error in the ingoal.

The defending team shouldn't be rewarded for the attacking team making an error in a try scoring situation... it's rewarding failure for letting them get to that situation in the first place.

This is my problem with it, however it came about.

 

[Johnny92]

I think you're right, the two were intertwined, and Bennett playing to his team's strengths in order to tactically take Slater's kick returns out of the game would have had the NRL in crisis mode.

Wasn't it also Inglis and Barba they were doing it to aswell?

 

[winslow_wong]

the nrl shouldn’t have gone to the extent of punishing the attacking team, with 7 tackles, for knocking on while scoring a try or a short grubber kick on the 5th going dead.

 

[McHunt]

Sir Peter V'Landys, obviously.

Rothfield:

"The NRL since Peter V’landys came on board has become the most innovative sporting organisation in the country. As a result the game is flying with record TV ratings, memberships, crowds and betting turnover. There have been some great innovations with the two-point field goals, rules to speed up the game, the Dolphins entry into the competition, Magic Round and more NRL matches in the bush."​

​

"The best however is yet to come. The plan to open the 2024 season in Las Vegas is huuuuge."​