Sports After Dark

Aw Ref #3 - The Scrum

Posted by Hamish McBrearty on July 18th, 2007

This week’s “Aw Ref” focuses on a contest unlike anything in any other sport in the world, the scrum. While it has been made much safer in recent years, it is still an area that is misunderstood by many.

The Laws of the game say the scrum is: “The purpose of the scrum is to restart play quickly, safely and fairly, after a minor infringement or a stoppage.” As the scrum follows minor infringements such as knock ons or forward passes, it is a common sight on the rugby field and can make an excellent attacking platform.

The Law goes on to define a scrum as: “A scrum is formed in the field of play when eight players from each team, bound together in three rows for each team, close up with their opponents so that the heads of the front rows are interlocked. This creates a tunnel into which a scrum half throws in the ball so that front row players can compete for possession by hooking the ball with either
of their feet.”

There is an old school of thought which says that a strong scrum goes a long way towards winning a game. While the game has changed a lot since in recent years, this still rings true to a lesser extent.

The engine room of the scrum is the front row, two props and a hooker, and each position is highly specialised. The props help anchor the scrum and also attempt to gain an advantage over their opponents, while the hooker, who also provides some power, will hook the ball as it is fed into the scrum.

Props are typically solidly built and extremely strong men, but need to employ good technique if they are to compete at the highest level. When All Black Carl Hayman came up against Wallaby Matt Dunning in the recent Tri-Nations test in Melbourne, it was Hayman’s near flawless technique rather than his tremendous strength that allowed him to dominate Dunning.

Hayman is considered by many to be the best prop in the world currently. His play at tighthead prop is one of the main reasons for the domination shown by the All Black scrum in recent tests. Despite being a tall man for a prop, Hayman is able to use his size against opponents and rarely takes a backwards step.

The other forwards involved in the scrum are the locks and loose forwards who have very different roles. The locks job is to simply provide additional power behind their front rowers, whereas the loose forwards are looking to get to the next phase of play as quickly as possible to either make tackles or support their team mates.

The final player involved in the scrum is the half back who feeds the ball into the scrum. For a number of seasons the IRB has implored referees to police the feed more strictly. Currently referees are asking half backs for “credible” feeds, meaning some part of the ball must touch the imaginary line down the centre of the scrum.

Many years ago the scrum was the main source of serious spinal injuries, but thanks to education initiatives such as Small Blacks to All Blacks or the Front Row Factory, and greater control given to the referees, the scrum is now quite same and serious injuries have been reduced dramatically.

This season has seen a slight alteration to the way referees control the scrum engagement process. Referees now call, “Crouch, touch, pause, engage” The addition of the touch and pause calls initially caused some difficulty for the players, but now that they are used to the new rhythm the scrums have settled down.

Once the scrum has successfully engaged, the props must bind onto the body of their opposite and push straight, not upwards or in towards the centre. While the ball remains in the scrum the loose forwards must remain bound and cannot adjust their angle.

The players who are not involved in the scrum must remain behind the line of the last man’s foot until the scrum ends when either the ball comes out or the last man detaches from the scrum. There are other scrum infringements such as ‘foot up’ or a non front rower playing the ball in the tunnel, but these are highly technical and rare even at club level.

The scrum is a contest for the ball even though the team which puts the ball in almost always wins it, but recently more and more referees have begun to treat it as a method of restarting play, even penalising teams for competing.

There are still many mysteries in the scrum, especially around front row techiniques, but the laws have well defined and easily understood roles for each player involved. Even if you fail to understand the subtleties of the front row, the scrum is actually far simpler than it looks.

Next week’s “Aw Ref” will answer some of the questions I most commonly field from players and fans.