The Wooden Spoon

razorblunt

thomond2006 wrote: »

Dupont daring Gilchrist to give away the penalty. Gilchrist obliges.

I can't fathom how he's Edinburgh captain and an international player. If he wasn't wearing a scrum cap you'd miss him. Toolis is a much better player.

Bradbury is another benefitting from local lad blindness.

Ardillaun

Bastareaud showed a bit of finesse with that chip over the defence and the young lads looked promising. Bamba was a big improvement over Atonio. He was excellent in all aspects of play.

Why don’t refs let scrums carry on a bit? At 38 minutes the French scrum was clearly going forward but the ref demanded the ball be used.

sydthebeat

Ardillaun wrote: »

Why don’t refs let scrums carry on a bit? At 38 minutes the French scrum was clearly going forward but the ref demanded the ball be used.

i dont know that particular scrum... but sometimes teh ref might deem both sides to have popped up at once, which would be a reset.... regardless of one team moving forward... and the ref would rather the team use the ball if its available to be played.

Losty Dublin

Ardillaun wrote: »

Why don’t refs let scrums carry on a bit? At 38 minutes the French scrum was clearly going forward but the ref demanded the ball be used.

A scrum is a means of restarting a game after a break in play. It's not really in the interests and spirit of the game to win the ball at a scrum and then sit with it not playing it. If a referee sees the ball at the back and it's clearly won then you need to play the ball. There is also an issue of safety; you can't expect the front rows to stay bound for any longer than is required to see the ball played. Leave the ball in there forever and somebody in the front row will get hurt sooner or later.

Obviously there is a difference whereby a team can scrummage better than their opposition and able to gain a yard or two but the expectation to play the ball promptly when it is available to play still applies, especially when a scrum begins to fall apart as the risk of injury here is quite high.

Ardillaun

Losty Dublin wrote: »

A scrum is a means of restarting a game after a break in play. It's not really in the interests and spirit of the game to win the ball at a scrum and then sit with it not playing it. If a referee sees the ball at the back and it's clearly won then you need to play the ball. There is also an issue of safety; you can't expect the front rows to stay bound for any longer than is required to see the ball played. Leave the ball in there forever and somebody in the front row will get hurt sooner or later.

Obviously there is a difference whereby a team can scrummage better than their opposition and able to gain a yard or two but the expectation to play the ball promptly when it is available to play still applies, especially when a scrum begins to fall apart as the risk of injury here is quite high.

The scrum was called about six seconds after the ball went in. I don’t think that’s a long time.

Losty Dublin

Ardillaun wrote: »

The scrum was called about six seconds after the ball went in. I don’t think that’s a long time.

That's as much as you need to complete a scrum. As the saying goes, Slow Ball Is No Ball.

Ardillaun

That sounds like rugby league to me. What’s the point of having world-class scrummagers among your forwards?