Just when we've finally got the referee's judgement out of the obstruction rule and made it a matter of physical fact, we've taken a massive step backwards on it IMO.



The whole "was the defender disadvantaged" is a subjective judgement that creates inconsistency. I'll give it a couple of controversial big decisions before fans and pundits are screaming for clarity again.



How - after the Ryan Hall decision in the Four Nations - anyone can suggest the VR having to find incontrovertible evidence to overturn the on-field decision is workable simply amazes me. Nothing wrong with the VR system as it was.



I like the idea of the sin bin now being an option for crusher/chicken wing tackles and other foul play. Just hope referees have the guts to use it rather than cop out.

I can understand the issue with the obstruction rule. It had been redrafted to being a matter of fact rather than opinion, but that left us in a silly position of having an obstruction penalty when nobody was obstructed. I like that a player has to be obstructed for it, I think that is right. I think having tries ruled out on such 'technicalities' is not what the game is about. However that will lead to more inconsistency. It does give the referees an easy out though. "I didn't think he was sufficiently obstructed" can't really be argued with.



Agree entirely with you about the VR. Stupid and ridiculous decision.



Id go even further with the sin bin, mandatory sin bin for any high-tackle. I think we would see the amount of them drop drastically, and tackling change slightly which would allow more offloads and promoting of the ball. All good things in my opinion.

I’m in favour of a slight reduction in the number of subs but nothing too drastic since I think the big fellas do bring something unique to the game and to go back to the days of 15 and 16 stone props would be a retrograde move.



Cutting out the wrestling by penalising players who continue to wrestle after calling “held” would help as it’d get rid of a lot of rubbish at the PTB.



I think both these moves would help.



If that didn’t work I’d look to re-introduce some kind of way teams could battle for possession of the ball. You can’t strip the ball in a tackle unless it’s 1 on 1, scrums are uncontested, you can’t strike in the play-the-ball, so how do you get the ball back if a team is completing its sets? They changed from the unlimited tackles rule because teams played up the jumper boring RL. Maybe something needs to give here? I think it’s a bigger problem in the NRL than SL but if games become too sterile I’d look at one of the options above.



As for bringing in interpretations into the obstruction rule we run the risk of endless debates about decisions as there’s bound to be inconsistencies. I’m not keen on that but at times last year tries were ruled out on technicalities that didn’t seem to be based in common sense. I don’t think there’s an easy option here TBH. Perhaps we just need to accept that refs might sometimes get it wrong but move on and not bother with over analysing things?

Bringing the defensive line back to 5 metres instead of 10 would IMO make teams play better attacking rugby if they wanted to move the ball down the field. It might also encourage better development of kicking games and better strategy. Too easy now to make 7-10 metres a carry with a one up hit. 5 drives then a very ordinary kick and you have the opposition starting their set on their 20 and that seems to be classed as a good result for most teams these days. Completely boring to watch.

Totally agree...as it is at the moment RL is not the 'great product' on the field that we all keep saying it is. Too much reliance on the physicality and athleticism at the expense of guile and ball skills. 5 metre rule would make for a big improvement

I agree there's too much focus on physicality and athleticism, I wouldn't call it a reliance. But I disagree entirely moving the defence 5m closer. You'd have the attacking side going backwards. The halves have little to no time to take on defences as it is, which is why we've got the current glut of 3rd man plays and not much else.



I honestly think the only way to open up the games is to have less mobile forwards.

Or fewer forwards.



On the VR, changing the way they are used made it work far better in the NRL. It really does seem to take some of the pressure off the VR and the ref combined. What we had previously is refs sending everything to the VR, who would then look endlessly from all angles. With the newer system they only look for strong evidence to overrule the ref.

Why do we want to "open up" the game though?



There are plenty of points scored in SL, so defences clearly aren't on top and dominating games. Why make it easier for attacking sides by just exploiting fatigue?



How is that going to teach players to be more creative with the ball and make better decisions under pressure - both things we need IMO in order to compete with Australia and New Zealand?

Reducing the gap to 5m would significantly reduce fatigue in the defence. Also, it might well lead to more messing around at the tackle by defenders attempting to gain time for the line to space itself properly.

I think players are too fit nowadays for 5m to work. Line speed and modern defensive organisation would stifle creativity.



By "open tha game up" I mean introduce more variety to play. Less 5 drives and kick. Allow some rule changes to reward creativity and re-introduce some excitement that was lost when the battle for possession was downgraded. The way the game is played has become very strutured in recent years and can become very predictable.

I actually don't believe players are significantly fitter then they were in the mid eighties. Full time pros have a slight edge on their part time predecessors but I think the large number of interchanges allows average forwards to come on and gas it for 20. We are at a stage where skill has been superceded by the ability to get off the line quick and blow your lungs out for 20 minutes smashing the ball one up. Look at what Stevie Ward has slowly turned into. If you give defences the edge using the rules then I think you would force deeper attacking lines, better offloading in the middle in traffic from big men who could actually handle the ball and some actual thought and skill. A different type of player would become valuable and a kicking game would be an absolute priority - in danger of quoting Stevo, the short kick over a rapidly advancing defence would suddenly become an option. At the moment I could kick at SL level.

Attacking rugby is too safe, it's too easy to make metres and wait for a mistake from the opposition. You don't have to earn territory these days. If you watch entertaining games from the 70's and 80's you see the ball changes hands a lot more often as attacking players push and try things. There are more passes before contact - essential to open up a defence - but risky as every pass these days has to be justified. It might take a while - several years maybe - but a new generation of kids with hands, rather than body builders (the Burgess twins come to mind) would come through.



Never going to happen, but it would be interesting to see the experiment.

but as we saw in the internationals, it leeds to more wrong decisions. Or as it led to with the Hall incident, the VR spending ages looking at all the angles and still getting the wrong decision. Following the NRL seems a crazy idea when the NRL's officials are held in a pretty low regard.