Bring back the maul: Consensus on ELVs
ByWhile the IRB meet and discuss which ELVs to keep and which ones to ditch, there is a clear signal that some laws are universally liked and others are universally loathed.
Allowing a maul to be collapsed clearly falls into the latter category. Former All Black captain Taine Randell explained this well in his Sunday News column. (Yes I know it’s Wednesday)
But the ELV that allows mauls to be pulled down has affected the game in a really bad way.
Mauling is a highly skilled activity. The best opportunity you get to do a maul is from a lineout. But because you can pull a maul down, usually the attacking team have five or six players in it who are collapsing to the ground while the defending team may only have a couple of players in it.
So right away you’ve got a mismatch to the advantage of the defenders. But if mauls came back because you weren’t able to collapse them, it would create more space out wide.
So by allowing more activity in the tight play, you get more room for the back. Sounds paradoxical, but it’s true. There are, of course, the nay-sayers who will say that teams like the 2003 England team use the rolling maul to their advantage and play boring rugby. But honestly, it’s winning rugby and if they have the talent to execute a good rolling maul, more power to them.
Fortunately Stuff are reporting that the IRB have recommended to retain the maul.
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The Bring back the maul: Consensus on ELVs by Hamish McBrearty, unless otherwise expressly stated, is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 License.
