Loose Pass: Try bonus points are too cheap in England and a law discussion worth having
Loose Pass: Try bonus points are too cheap in England and a law discussion worth having
This week we will mostly be concerning ourselves with the outbreak of big scores, peculiar kit decisions and a law discussion moment…
High scores might be great, but the question of bonus points begins to nag
If you wanted proof that rugby has never been more entertaining – whether actually better is a moot point for an inter-generational debating chamber, but we’re looking only at entertaining – you’d be hard-pushed to look beyond the past weekend’s Prem scores. The games averaged 68 points per game, compared to 43.2 in the 2015/6 season and 49.8 across all regular-season games since 2015.
Points per game have steadily increased from 43.2 in 2015/6, crossing the 50-point threshold in 2021/2 and almost crossing 60 last season. Tries per game are on the increase too; last season there were 8.6 tries per game, compared to 4.7 in 2015/6. Meanwhile, the percentages of points scored from tries and non-tries are on a steady change as well, from almost 47% of points kicked in 2015/6 down to under 30 per cent for last season.
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This, you would be hard-pushed not to think, is all good news. More tries, more attacking, less time wondering what Owen Farrell is looking at as his head flicks from side to side during his kicking routine.
But there is an unconsidered flip side to this. Back in those days when almost half the points were kicked, that four-try bonus point was a tougher prize to come by. Tries per team per game hovered at around 2.3, so to nab those crucial try bonuses you needed to almost double the average try count.
That’s not the case any more. Last season tries per team per game crossed the four-try mark, meaning that for a team NOT to grab a four-try bonus was more of an outlier than the norm. Try bonus points per team per game have almost trebled during that timespan, from 0.2 to 0.58. Losing bonus points have fallen very slightly, but are generally stable.
These are not a problem, but the try bonus is starting to be a little too cheap. The total shot up from a steady 80-odd per season up to 2021, to 117 the following season. Covid disruption might have played a part there, while the effect of the World Cup year made itself felt in 2023/4 in a fall back to 70, but the past two seasons have seen TBP counts of 107 and 92 respectively, while losing bonuses are falling away in number. Total bonus points have been reasonably consistent as a consequence, but given that this means that more teams are getting bonus points in defeat for scoring tries, again, we have entertainment value, but are we really getting rugby value?
Of the three losing teams to snaffle a try bonus the weekend past, two of the teams got their fourth try in the final five minutes. In neither case did it mean anything to the outcome of the match and the winning teams were in cruise mode. In the URC, Ulster were 34-7 down before mounting their comeback at home to Edinburgh, who clearly switched off and almost chucked the game away.
But in France, Pau’s ultimately emphatic win over an injury-weakened La Rochelle was kept interesting because the Bearnais were constantly on the brink of losing the bonus point you get for winning by three tries or more. Perpignan may, in their quest to avoid the relegation playoffs for the third straight year, yet regret their inability to maintain the three-try lead they had early in the game against Bordeaux on Saturday.
Try bonuses in England are now becoming too cheap, particularly those gained by a losing team during garbage time, and while we can all appreciate the improved spectacle that the Prem is providing, changing the bonus-point structure to the ‘win by three tries’ bonus might redress the competitive and defensive balance of many a match and reward defence, as well as entertainment. Defence is a part of rugby after all, no matter how many phone calls you need to penalise a tackler.
Who chooses the colours?
In an age where teams roll out several sets of jerseys each season to commemorate charity drives, tournament participations, new sponsors, mother-in-laws’ birthdays and goodness knows what else – and never mind the debate about making life easier for colourblind viewers – you’d think someone, somewhere, might have flagged up the ludicrous similarities between the Bulls and Zebre kits at the weekend?
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Is handing the ball on still passing?
Law discussion time. Brive set up a maul against Colomiers in the Pro D2 on Friday, which saw several instances of unbinding and rebinding by the attacking team, which still plague mauls at all levels and are so rarely penalised.
But in this instance, a pair of Brive players splintered off, both with forearms wrapped around the ball. Hooker Yannis Charcosset and winger Geoffrey Cros both rumbled forward. A defender went to tackle Charcosset, stopping his forward momentum but also meaning that Cros continued his, so that by the time the ball got to the line, all Cros had to do was take the ball from Charcosset to score.
Charcosset had the ball in his hands when the splintering occurred, but when he let go for Cros to cross the line, Cros was demonstrably in front of him.
Is this not some form of forward pass? The relevant rugby law with forward passes, Law 11, only deals with throwing the ball forward or knocking it on. In Law 16.2, which deals with ball transfer, no direction is specified: “A player ripping the ball from the ball carrier must stay in contact with that player until they have transferred the ball.” Which is exactly what happened.
Yet perhaps we need a tweak or a clarification. It seems odd that a player can transfer the ball to a player standing in front of him, bound or not, maul or not. Have a look for yourselves here: