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Why this Super League rule should be changed in 2023

Once upon a time, when you kicked the ball dead the opposition would simply get a tap on the 20-metre line and would begin a normal six tackle set from there.

But nowadays teams are punished even more. Not only do they give up 20 metres, they also hand the opposition an extra tackle.

Often by the end of these seven-tackle sets, teams are probing in the opposition’s half looking for a try. Now you might think that’s fair, after all it was a poor kick for it go dead and therefore the team who kicked it should be punished right?

That’s a perfectly acceptable view point as is the notion that this punishment stops teams kicking the ball dead intentionally to waste time.

However, it punishes people for being creative and instead of being dull and tacking the tackle and being positive and trying to conjure up an exciting moment. If it these moments pay off, we’d be watching some of these tries on highlight reels for weeks on end, instead though players are no more likely to play it safe and get tackled in the corner on the last tackle to ensure they don’t concede an extra tackle and instead build pressure.

In fact, overall we see a lot less kicking near the opposition tryline as teams fear it could go dead and hand the opposition a major advantage. Ultimately, this means we see less tries from these positions, less creativity and a less positive product.

To me this should be changed. We should encourage creativity and the best way to do that is the changing of this rule so that attacking flair isn’t punished.

At the end of the day, Super League has always prided itself on creativity and exciting attacking rugby and the rules should encourage that not dissuade players from looking to score on the last.

If you recall, one of the best tries of this year’s Grand Final was a grubber kick into the in goal from Jack Welsby.

Had he been dissuaded from doing so because of the rule, we would have been robbed of one of the better moments in the Grand Final.

An example of why it needs to change.

1 Comment

1 Comment

  1. Graham

    December 19, 2022 at 10:17 am

    Is this an open forum to change the rules if so here are mine

    Bin the 6 again and give a full penalty
    Make sure the attacking player players the ball with his foot
    When you get tackled over the try line it’s a 20m restart to the defence
    All errors and touch kicks restart with a scrum at the place of error or 10m from the touchline
    Bring back contested scrums and stop rolling the ball at the back of the props leg. I. E feed fairly
    Limit substitutions to one appearance

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