In the late ’90s, a sixty-year-old Welshman warned us: “The first dribbling hit, the second the defender’s fault.” This maxim expired today because today Any bouncing ball on the rugby court betrays the defenders’ poor positions.. And this professionalization Rugby benefits increased rapidly players coming to the point of turning it into another sport.
Galthie and “American refrigerators”
a game today More physical, where players’ weight, height, speed, and thus strength increase rapidly.. 80% of players on a professional team are between 90 and 120 kilos, most of them around 1.90; Classical morphology of the second row during the Five Nations non-circus era. This is what French coach Fabien Galthie affectionately calls “American refrigerators”. Added to this morphological growth is the increase in effective play, so they need to be mobile and explosive at the same time. This resulted in the pitch remaining small and in a more predictable rugby, the defenses outweighed the attacks. For this reason Balls no longer bounce on rugby courts…
This ‘physicalization’ of the game also led to tactical conservatism, which featured a game with fewer passes and more runs to limit the risk of defeat. Bad times for lyrics. “You enter the jungle by avoiding and hitting trees,” warns French teacher Villepreux. individual technique for creating spaces where there is no. And it did so by ‘producing’ forwards with good hands who provided more continuity with what the Saxons call ‘unloading’ and here ‘post-contact pass’. Hit and discharge before it lands to keep the ball alive and maintain an advantage.
Today’s rugby relies on increasingly long game sequences. Up to two minutes of continuous play phases are interconnected; something that happens ten to twelve times per game if we analyze the stats. This is where these cyborgs need to show off, in addition to their devastating physiques, good lungs to reach every corner and above all the clairvoyant ability that kiwis call “blue heads”. make the right decision in every match situation no matter how much pressure they endure.
Two schools in new environment
This very physical scenario spawned different ways of approaching it. On one side is the game plan of the coach who bets. Not taking risks with the ball so as not to make mistakes and putting pressure on the opponent to optimize the mistakes on the contrary. Cartesian elections that say nothing to either the opponent or the audience. Eddie Jones’ teams, which Borthwick brought to England, Gatland’s Wales, and even Australia with mats rather than baskets, offer this tough profile. Something that requires obedient players who stick to the plan.
South Africa and Ireland lining up the mid wingers are a nuanced evolution of this tough game of rugby. In the case of bokke, which made a huge leap in quality with the integration of black players into Springboks after what happened with Mandela with the famous ‘Bomb Squad’ in 1995. Six forwards coming out of the bench to smash their opponents with the glorification of physical crushing. But, this leaves his line more neglected. In Ireland, the Munster-Leinster duo still offer evasive automatisms when the ball reaches the lanes with good feet by the ‘back three-pointer’.
Then there are those neurons give priority to muscles. Teams that bet on what we might call ‘Rugby Sapiens’, like New Zealand. “There are two types of players: those who close their eyes while batting and those who fight with their eyes open,” said the Welsh coach. Kiwis are a prime example of the latter. Thinking the ball in their hands, players read every game situation and risk looking for an imbalance, not just protecting it. Add to this an innate ability to perform in hostile scenarios. No one suffers as much as the All Blacks.
Having beaten all teams in the southern hemisphere in the last three years, France has spawned a striker who can compete in this physical context while retaining the elusive gene that has characterized them for years. It is led by Toto Dupont, the most influential player in world rugby, and conditions everything from the offensive half position. No one can touch the ball or travel more meters than him. Get the first ball off the ground and always give the last support. Galthie made it clear to her ‘carriers’:You throw yourself into an open grave at intervals and gain the advantage streak, support is already a matter of who comes out”. A kind of galloping ‘Rugby Champagne’. Argentina is also a deep team; Very aggressive on defense and even more aggressive on offense, they always make one more pass to find the lane. Strong in battle, smart in space, Cougars take on what British bookies call the ‘black horse’.
The world is ‘multicultural’
But this will be an event at the World Cup. very attractive tactical scenario For different proposals to coexist: Japan’s ‘Kamikaze Rugby’, Georgia’s orthodox attack and maul game, solidarist Uruguayan fortitude, Italian ‘fun’, new depth of Tongans, Fijians and Samoans returning home after rescuing the former All Blacks, The Scottish epic, the fervent three-quarters of the Portuguese… The “softening of identity traits” that Villepreux speaks of reappears with the equalization of the physical factor.
Unlike the more limited World Cups of recent times, Engaging variety of offers with all the nuances of current rugby: From the Georgian orthodox static game to the insane Polynesian continuum, from the devastating eights on the offensive to others that create tons of play around them, from top-notch defenders to enviable versatility, to the canonical openings of the telemetric foot, dozens of people living in the December are huge front rows against men with a name in the trade… cyborgs rethink In this rugby game, every detail, every decision can be decisive.