RugbyRebels

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union ... rxy3j65ggo

Fascinating idea - does damage one of the major tenets of the sport as being for all sizes, but I would be intrigued to see what one of the games looked like.

Puja

Interesting concept. Might certainly be easier on the joints than having some 20+ stone prop coming at you. Mind you at the lower levels the big props just come straight at you so go low and it's easy enough to bring them down.

Sounds like the Bristol academy didn't do him a lot of favours. Sort of reminds me of Jack Rowntree coming through at Tigers. They might get away with being mobile props at age grade and develop decent technique but never going to have the frame to play pro rugby if getting up to 17 stone is an effort.

Puja wrote: ↑Fri Feb 28, 2025 12:08 am https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union ... rxy3j65ggo

Fascinating idea - does damage one of the major tenets of the sport as being for all sizes, but I would be intrigued to see what one of the games looked like.

Puja

All shapes and sizes has been a bit of a red herring for some time now, most half backs are still at least 6 foot. If the game was as well-equipped as kickball we'd probably have weight classes already

This would have been spot on for me. At my heaviest I was about 90kg but my regular weight hovers around 80kg.

Although, as FKAS said, tackling bigger, heavier props and locks (at a lower level) is often easier.

Should certainly be graded by weight rather than age - not so sure at adult level, but certainly an interesting idea

I've always thought this sounds ideal to me. My fighting weight is about 72kg so removing all the hulking brutes sounds great. Although I fear would instead end up being lumbering and slow.

Danno wrote: ↑Fri Feb 28, 2025 7:42 am

Puja wrote: ↑Fri Feb 28, 2025 12:08 am https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union ... rxy3j65ggo

Fascinating idea - does damage one of the major tenets of the sport as being for all sizes, but I would be intrigued to see what one of the games looked like.

Puja

All shapes and sizes has been a bit of a red herring for some time now, most half backs are still at least 6 foot. If the game was as well-equipped as kickball we'd probably have weight classes already

Maybe at professional level, but definitely not at amateur level. There's no other aerobic sport that would take my current build and, not only tolerate it, but consider it a virtue in some ways.

Puja

The more I think about this, these games would be very, very demanding. I remember playing against a side who 3x in a row apparently didn’t have a front row so we had to play uncontested scrums against a team of young, athletic twenty-somethings who all seemed to be clones of each other. It was hell and we got stuffed every time.

This feels like it would be like that but with contested scrums and less of mismatch.

Scrumhead wrote: ↑Sat Mar 01, 2025 9:16 am The more I think about this, these games would be very, very demanding. I remember playing against a side who 3x in a row apparently didn’t have a front row so we had to play uncontested scrums against a team of young, athletic twenty-somethings who all seemed to be clones of each other. It was hell and we got stuffed every time.

This feels like it would be like that but with contested scrums and less of mismatch.

Hah - wouldn't be the Bath University Jägers, would it? They pulled that trick on my old team twice and it was hell both times (and that was back in the days when I played openside without people looking at me and saying, "What, really?!"). We were sold that they were a social team made of drunken students who didn't train, but they were all you and fast and 20, which personally I regard as cheating.

Second time, they promised they'd have a front row, so we accepted the friendly, but they then turned up and were apparently short so had to go uncontested. We offered to loan them however many front row they needed to make up the numbers to go contested, on the basis that we could slow them down by making them push for a bit, but it turned out they would've needed 3 loaners to make a front row.

We didn't play them the next season, for some reason.

Puja

It wasn’t. I actually can’t remember who it was though? Someone in the Surrey reserve leagues.

We had a couple of 20 stone props so who weren’t spectacularly mobile so you can imagine how the games played out.

Good luck to those who enjoy it but I wouldn't be supportive of it taking hold in the UK (or at the professional level) although it's in line with a lot of the clueless world rugby directives. I imagine it is pretty turgid to watch - the beauty of the game is the set piece demanding size and draining legs to create space.

As an aside, one thing I would however be supportive of is limiting the subs from the bench to between 3 and 5.