Keith Wood weighs in on bench debate and calls for change from eight players

Ireland legend Keith Wood insists that cutting the bench to five will benefit the sport going forward.

Thirty years ago, substitutions were not a thing in rugby before changes were made in the mid-1990s.

There were six replacements allowed at the 1995 Rugby Rugby World Cup before that was increased to seven, which remained in place until the early 2010s – in the international game at least.

Eight replacements were already being used in the club game in England and France when World Rugby increased the squads to 23 ahead of the 2012 November internationals.

South Africa’s bench

The flexibility allowed by the eight-person bench means that coaches continue to experiment, with the Springboks the latest to do something unique.

South Africa named seven forwards and one back for their game against New Zealand last weekend, but Wood was not enamoured by that move.

“I did an interview 20 years ago with the Guardian and they were asking the things you would like to change in the sport,” he told Off The Ball.

“I said: ‘I don’t like the idea of getting on top of your opposition having played 60 minutes and then changing the whole front-row.’ They’re all three 19-stone guys, and you have to play against them for the last 20.

“I grew up in a time when you didn’t go off. You only went off for injury. I sat on the bench for Ireland and didn’t get on for 10 or 12 caps because there was no injury.

“It’s what I grew up in; it was what I was used to. Twenty years ago, I would have said: ‘Yeah, I don’t want to have any of those on at all.’

“Now, if you ask me, I would say that I would like it to be an awful lot less. I would want there to be three front-rows for health and safety reasons.

“I would like to have a utility forward and a utility back. With five, it would cover it; you have a squad of 20.”

Wood also insists that a smaller squad would make the game fairer and help the tier-two nations, who rarely have the depth to compete with the behemoths of the sport.

“I don’t know if any of those things would happen because none of the coaches will want that to happen, but it tends to bring the game closer to a level of equity,” he said.

“We know for the smaller countries, it’s much harder to get eight impact subs. You will often hear the commentary about, ‘Well, that bench is much better than the other bench. They have a good XV, but their eight aren’t as good as the others.’”

His own experience

Players continue to get bigger and stronger in the modern game, but Wood believes that his idea could help reduce the sheer force in contact, potentially reducing the number of injuries going forward.

“In terms of health and safety, I would love to see how they would compare in terms of whether you would be better off with players that are smaller and fitter and able to last for 80 minutes,” he added.

“My only anecdotal evidence, I would say, is that I played mostly 16 to 17 stone, but I played one season in 1998 at 18 stone, and I didn’t finish a game because I couldn’t get 18 stone around the field for 80 minutes.

“I then dropped that weight and started finishing games again. You want to be on at the end of the game; you still want to have that fitness and impact to be able to do it.”

READ MORE: Eddie Jones explains why ‘courageous’ Springboks are changing the game