I played rugby and actively follow it and football but it's harder and harder to grapple with the long term consequences of these sports as more information about damage especially from sub-concussion level impacts comes out. It's hard to imagine but I think the NFL will have a serious reckoning over the next 10-20 years unless they can fix this somehow
Can they change the rules to any reasonable degree to mitigate the risk? Other codes, like Association, are far lower contact than the Rugby or American rules.
I'm not confident that any rule changes will have a meaningful impact. It's thought that it isn't just collisions to the head that cause a problem, but all tackles. This is because your brain gets damaged when it moves around in your skull, and this will happen every time your velocity suddenly changes e.g. when being tackled to the ground. This is also the reason that headguards/scrumcaps aren't effective in cutting down on head injuries.
What can be done to protect the players is limiting the number of contact training sessions they can attend, and also limiting the number of games a season each player is allowed to play.
Another option could be to seriously limit the number of substitutes each team is allowed to make, as this will mean the players will have to be fitter and therefore not as big, and hopefully this will reduce the impact each tackle will have. However Rugby League is also having to deal with head injuries and that game requires a lot more fitness than Rugby Union.
I expect that, like League, Union will lose the contested scrum at some point. That will at least lead to a decrease in the asymmetry in weight between forward and back. A step in the right direction, and nothing really lost in the game since scrums aren't really contested any more.
I'm not so sure that'll be a good thing for safety (collapsed scrums aside).
It'll eliminate a role for stocky, relatively slow moving 18 stone players specialising in scrum technique, and create more roles for fast, athletic 17 stone players specialised in blasting opponents out the way. It'll also mean the ball's in play for longer, resulting in more impacts overall.
I agree. I also can't imagine that World Rugby would consider removing one of the two elements of the game that differentiate it from Rugby League (the other one being contested rucks).
As a League fan I'd love it - I don't care what it's called I'd just like more people to play and watch Rugby League.
Yep. They've been tinkering with the scrum ever since I was a kid, but to me it feels like they result in a collapse, a penalty[0] or one side being totally steamrolled 90% of the time. I wish I had stats at hand to back this up, but I feel like even though they're technically "contested" they're rarely actually contested.
If it's not enjoyable for spectators, doesn't really do much for the game and is dangerous then I can see why it could get phased out in the long run.
I don't think this is accurate. The majority of scrums at every level lead either to possession for the team with the put-in, or a penalty in their favour. If the weaker team has the put-in, they can pretty much roll the ball straight back to the number 8 and get it away (possibly not in the rules but completely never policed).
It's exciting when either side gets a shove on and that there's at least the possibility to win one against the head, but I agree the game wouldn't lose that much for anyone but the purists and the front row specialists if we just moved to uncontested scrums.
In theory, the weaker team can "try" to get the ball out the back as fast as possible but in practice, I see penalties for teams getting steamrolled in the scrum quite often which would suggest that the tactic is not entirely effective.
I don't understand much of what goes on in the scrum, but I love watching the battle for dominance over the course of a game. Are there collapsed scrums frequently? Yes. But it is an aspect of the sport that gives a chance for the heavies to shine. The increasing use of mauls on the other hand...
Like I said I don’t have the data, so maybe take 90% with a grain of salt :-) But some 6 Nations games in recent years have been pretty frustrating wrt scrum, and I don’t see it getting any more interesting or safe
There are almost constant rule changes around the tackle laws, the breakdown and de-powering the scrum to reduce the amount of potential head trauma, but the professional era it's like an arms race. Even padding and head-gear, players seem to hit with even more force. And, like the article says, a lot of the concussions happen during the training sessions which is way more than the average amateur player would experience. It's still relatively soon to see the longer-term effects; the early batch of professionals from the mid/late 90s will soon be entering their 60s and I expect there will be more research papers..
IIRC there are results around brain damage in association football as well, mostly due to players heading the ball.
Guess nobody has dared suggest prohibiting head playing in association football. Would be interesting to see how the game would change if such a rule would be enacted.
But it's one thing to not practise it, and another to actually ban it. I can see the latter in <5 years at all levels if the current research is followed up correctly.
1. Just ban it, with the same penalties as using your hands. I used to think that this was the way to go, but I rarely watched soccer. I still don't understand soccer but over the last week I've watched a fair bit [1] and see now that simply removing headers without replacing them would alter the game too much.
2. Have the players wear something like a tennis racquet but with a longer handle attached to their back with the head of it extending above the player's head. Players can hit the ball with this instead of the head. Hitting with their head is treated like using their hands as in #1.
This is one of those things that would probably be seen as fine if and only if it has been done that way for a long time. Otherwise, it is too ridiculous to seriously propose.
3. Players can deflect the ball with the part of their arm between the elbow and the wrist, but only if the elbow is above the ears. "Above" is defined relative to the player's orientation, not relative to the ground.
This seems like it could be a close enough replacement for heading to not alter things too much.
[1] I have a "free" (it is really a rental with $0/month rent) streaming box from my ISP that includes a free Peacock Premium subscription. The ISP noticed I rarely use it and asked me to return it if I'm not going to use it more. Everything I'm interested in on it I can get on my Fire TV or on my smart TV, including Peacock. But I'm not sure if the free Peacock Premium would continue, so instead I'm trying to use the "free" box more. One way I've done that is when I'm relaxing on the couch and not otherwise using the TV I've streamed replays and highlights from soccer, both to keep up usage on the box and to see if by watching enough soccer I'll eventually start to see that it only looks largely random and there really is a lot of skill and strategy and tactics involved.
4. Using head is prohibited, just like hands. Instead allow using the shoulders, maybe down to the elbow. From elbow downwards towards the hand still prohibited.
You could hypothetically go to something like touch rugby. But I don't know how you'd recreate some of the more unique features of rugby union, like contested scrums, rucks, and mauls. The game would probably look more like touch rugby league.
The rules of American football were changed in response to the 1905 season when 19 college players died. Instead of banning the sport completely, they started allowing forward passes. Which completely changed the game and made it safer.
There is not a singular risk. In rugby some risks come from intentional foul play or accidents (high tackles, disguised hits on static players players at rucks and mauls, scrum collapses, etc.) Others come from the constant, somewhat controlled impacts that exist in normal play. These can expose the tackler to the impact versus the individual being tackled.
Any discussion on this topic needs to recognise how the game of rugby union has changed. It rapidly went from amateur to professional, but took some time for the current level of power and fitness to develop. You had powerhouses like Lomu in the 90s, but from the early-2000s you have legions of Ma'a Nonu level players. Safety protocols seem to be pushed down to the junior game more readily than the adult professional game. Much influence has come from rugby league which arguably has popularised particular styles of play that hadn't been used in union.
There is much more that could be written about the historical changes, but it has made a big difference to safety while culturally making it harder to implement changes. Big tackles become what many viewers want to see in the game and this perpetuates both a style of tackling and bulking up that didn't exist before. Line speed is monitored closely and everything to improve this results bigger players moving more quickly which anecdotally results in more serious impacts. Authorities know it, but reducing it makes the game less exciting for TV audiences and there is less money to go around. It's a vicious cycle.
There are clear and obvious changes which can be tested in the game, but pushing these through takes a very long time. A concern some have expressed is around impact/tactical substitutions (https://www.theroar.com.au/2021/08/14/grossly-negligent-lion...). Adding a bunch of fresh players in soccer later in the game is common. The thinking carried over to rugby. It was attractive because you had chubbies like me at the front of the scrum who could perform higher over 40 minutes than the full 80 minutes. When you are adding huge Nonu-types into a game with tiring players then problems can occur. I can't imagine that changes will happen here rapidly.
The junior game becomes an easy place to push changes. The argument is made that children are being protected, but then the changes don't bubble up. Encouraging low tackling under a certain age is good, but tactics need to come along with these rules. Head-on tackles can go higher head-on because you are trying to hold the player up or in place versus taking them down and possibly allowing them a few feet past you to touch the ball down for a try. It's all interlinked.
In summary: yes, but it's up to the leaders to drive changes top down at all levels and accept that they may lose some revenue.
> Head-on tackles can go higher head-on because you are trying to hold the player up or in place versus taking them down and possibly allowing them a few feet past you to touch the ball down for a try
That's the crux of the problem. Low tackles are very efficient at bringing a player down to earth (especially if you're as skinny as I was in the kids' game) but they won't reverse his momentum if he's trying to get a yard beyond you (especially not if he's got the physique and low body position of a professional) or prevent him from offloading. So a rule change to enforce it and ban chest high tackles makes it very easy for a well drilled professional team to slowly move their way upfield with a relentless Warrenball-style series of impacts. Not necessarily safer overall, as well as duller to watch because they're so unlikely to lose the ball or even a yard in the tackle, which also discourages riskier creative plays. Probably you need more of a contest at the ruck to balance things out and give the other side a way of winning the ball back, but most of the rucking rules are there for safety reasons...
