I think if Johnson can keep the England team playing the same kind of attacking structure and intent as shown over the last couple of weeks they will be well worth watching especially with the likes of Foden ,Cueto ,Youngs and Flood who all enjoy and thrive on open attacking Rugby selected.

Until we get injuries to Flood & then we have to go back to Johnny Wilkinson!!

Enjoyed most of this afternoon watching 2 Union games on ESPN HD.

Leeds Carnegie are on next Sunday, losing away to Harlequins

I will always remember the Wigan versus Bath challenge matches.

There is undoubtedly a skill involved in Rugby Union forward play but as a spectacle give me RL, Superleague and especially NRL anytime.

That said I can see the growing danger to our game's future existence if RU continues to improve in its apparent growing ability to entertain with exciting running rugby. Still... We are not in the depths of Winter yet with all the accompanying mud inducing boring kick fests.

Summer rugby anyone ?

Although most posters don't seem to be aware, there's a union thread on here. Feel free to join us some time viewtopic.php?f=30&t=437277&start=840

Although most posters don't seem to be aware, there's a union thread on here. Feel free to join us some time viewtopic.php?f=30&t=437277&start=840

Nail on head. Two different sports, like comparing tennis with badminton.

Super 14 is dire and has been struggling in recent years. The rules (ELV's)they tested out to "make the game more entertaining" resulted in aimless kicking duels where the ball stayed in play but was just punted from one FB/Winger to the other ad nauseum.
Last year England couldn't play with the ball for more than 2 phases without kicking it (badly). This year they have oviously been told they'll be dropped permenantly (off a cliff) if they kick ball away for no good reason and hey presto, something that's effective and good to watch.
Scrummageing in Union is what it is - a contest - and an important one at that. RL scrums, when they were a contest, were probably the worst sporting spectacle I've ever seen.

The IRB introduced new refereeing interpretations to encourage more attacking play. Super 14 introduced the new style in February 2010 for the Super 14, the Northern hemisphere did it in September 2010www.greenandgoldrugby.com/sanzar’s-guide-to-sexy-rugbyrl]

Basically, Australia and NZ RUs (and to some extent, the PI Unions) have always wanted to play and reward more expansive, ball in hand Rugby, much closer to RL. The NH powers resisted the trend for some time, favouring 10 man, forward dominated, percentages Rugby. The All Blacks are most balanced, the Australian Wallabies have played some exciting games this year (incidentally 9 current Wallabies have an RL background or experience), but lack power in the scrum, and the forwards are struggling in the collisions.

Thing that kills the game for me, certainly in the premiership, is giving 3 points for a penalty kick.

Teams might be trailing by 10 points and finally get into an opponents 20m zone, only to then take a pop at goal instead of kicking for the corner and pushing for a try. Really hate that lack of ambition - well actually, it makes sense because you get 3 points and get the ball back - hence my problem with the scoring.

Drop it to 2 points, make tries more valuable. Then i'd be interested.

Seen Carnegie play at home to Sale this season which ended 6-3. Their game against Exeter this weekend ended 15-9. No tries in each. Utterly garbage. And it's honestly not just because of how bad Carnegie are.....

I'd agree with that. To make matters worse, coaches have encouaged wrestling and three man tackles to try to counteract these effects which reduces many games to the tedious lows historically associated with union, albeit that the handling skills are still generally superior. I much, much preferred our game when it used to be an impact sport.

I'd agree with you there. I can sort of see the reasoning for increasing penalties to 3 points in that they wanted to try and create a higher consequence for defending teams who continually gave away penalties on their own line, however all they've done is, as you say, make the attacking team go for the 3 points instead of pushing for the try.
Drop the penalty down to 2 points. Keep the try at 5 to make it more valuable and instead of penalising defending teams get the yellow card out more often and sin bin them if they continually offend on their own line. If an attacking team still goes for a penalty worth 2 points instead of attempting for a possible 7 against 13 or 14 men then their coach needs a good kicking.

Also put the drop goal down to 1 point instead of 3, no need for it to be at 3 and is far too much of a reward for not much.


Yep, there's still plenty of utter rubbish on show in Union and still to my amazement plenty of full time players who cant pass a ball properly. It does my head in.

they are contests, and there are specialist skills at work, but any restart that more often than not, causes another breakdown is of limited merit to me in terms of spectacle.

I'm no authority but don't they also receive a bonus competition point for losing a game by 7 points or less?

Probably an unintended consequence but evidence that administrators can be a bit dim at times.

It depends who is watching. I personaly love to see 8 Australians all being shunted backwards, upwards or into the ground by an English/Welsh/Irish front row. Also, in Union if scrummageing wasn't a contest (like the Australians would love), then you could have two more back row forwards on the pitch instead of props (hooker are already like back row forwards) and there would be even less space. But I realise that in a World where you have to compete for an audience that it might not appeal to a majority of viewers.