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THE RL1908 BLOG
News, Reviews & Opinion - Sean Fagan - RL1908.com
Even
a glancing look at film of rugby league from the
1950s is enough to tell us that the game today
is lightning-fast in comparison to what it once
was.
No
doubt, the old-timers of the 1950s who could recall
rugby league's first years and the 1910s held
the view that the game increased in pace as each
decade rolled by.
Of
course, change is always relative, and must be
placed in context.
While
a scrum in 2009 requires far less physical demand
than a 1959 scrum, the progress of football evolution
suggests that the scrums of 1909 were more demanding
on the forwards of that era than in 1959.
And
what of relativity to the other rugby code - is
the speed of the game and the scrum contest differences
between league and union in 2009 a similar gap
to that of 1909?
We
might actually be able to answer that question,
and reaffirm some century old cross-code "friendly"
presumptions.
While
the games have changed, the founding paradigms
still remain ...rugby league was a game on the
verge of being too fast for the players, and its
scrums were awfully close to being pointless...
Both
of these newspaper quotes from 1908 and 1909,
looking at the codes in Australia and New Zealand,
are from rugby union columnists, but it makes
them no less worthy.
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ABSOLUTELY RUN TO A STANDSTILL
Otago Witness, July 7, 1909
"The
football writer of Sydney's Referee,
in his remarks on the first match the New
Zealand professionals played against New
South Wales, says that the game was too
fast for the players. They were he states
absolutely run to a standstill before the
end of the game."
"He
advised some alterations in the rules so
that the game might be made slower. This
should commend itself to those who are agitating
for changes in the present Rugby [Union]
rules. It would be rather a novelty to see
any of our senior [rugby union] teams running
themselves to a standstill through an exceedingly
fast game, and having to alter the rules
to make it slower."
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NONSENSICAL SCRUMS
Taranaki Herald, September
21, 1908
"It
[rugby league] gives the backs a good many
more openings. But to accomplish this end
it reduces the scrummage to a vanishing
point. Indeed, it is difficult to see what
the scrum is for in the new game."
"It
[the scrum] breaks up and is done with the
instant the ball is put in, for the ball
is thrown [fed] in such a manner that it
immediately rebounds into the hands of the
half."
[and after the ball is kicked out on the
full, the players] "have to go back
again to the spot from which the kick was
made and there form one of the aforesaid
nonsensical scrums."
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Rugby
league today is seemingly then, despite 100 years
of changes, essentially still the same old game
- of being almost too fast for the players, and
possessing a scrum that ultimately delivers a
predictable outcome.
Somehow,
I don't think the code would mind another century
of the same criticism.
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