Quote: KaeruJim "I think we can all agree on the need to keep players as safe as possible. Nobody wants to see degenerative brain disease (although again the causal link is very difficult to establish scientifically).
The question is how we go about it. To what extent is risk inherent in the game? Is it possible to reduce the risk to nil, and if not what is an acceptable level? This is a pragmatic approach.
Also we have the refereeing of said rules. Because they are over-complicated and too broad at the same time, games are frequently being spoiled due to interpretations.
Show me a game of under-armpit level tackling that looks anything like rugby league, or which is any way refereeable and I might change my view. It turns games into penalty-fests and the result a lottery. There were lots of academy games trialling this last year and they were pretty much horrendous. I also still saw some head knocks despite the new rules.'"
If you think about any changes that are made are on a spectrum, and the easiest to do is to do nothing and leave things as they are, and the hardest thing to do would be to ban tackling above the belly button, as they were originally going to do in union, then lowering the tackle height to the armpit seems an ok compromise. The trial games were definitely a mess, but the data from those games showed it did significantly reduce the number of head contacts and accelerations, which is the primary objective. But a lot of work and dialogue is going to have to happen by all involved in order to make it watchable.
The coaches seemed pretty optimistic that the changes would be positive in the long-term, prior to the trial, but they'll know it will be a huge task to adjust in time for next season. I just hope they've started incorporating it into their training sessions.