Ex-Irish referees boss Owen Doyle has called on World Rugby to quickly ban the use of a tactic that has slowed down the on-pitch action.
The retired Test ref has expressed his annoyance about how teams frequently resort to the caterpillar ruck, delaying the use of the ball from the back of the breakdown.
It is a tactic that has been in use for quite some time now, with coaches encouraging players to latch onto the back of rucks in a straight line and stretch out their legs to provide additional protection for box-kicking scrum-halves. However, Doyle has grown tired of this tedious tactic and has called for a change to be adopted as quickly as possible.
It was after sharing his thoughts on the debate concerning kick chase blockers that he made his ban-the-caterpillar call. “The number of box kicks is a massive concern for the game, and for its appeal,” he wrote in his latest Irish Times column.
“Lawmakers must speed things up…”
“Mostly, these kicks come from slow breakdown ball, and that’s where the lawmakers must start to speed things up. The elongated caterpillar rucks need to be banned, post-haste.
“Once the ball has been won, no other player should be allowed to join it. When they do, it might be as much as 10 seconds before the ball emerges, and it is inevitably going to be kicked. Whereas fast ruck ball, of two to three seconds, is what provides dynamic running play.
“Referees are supposed to call ‘use it’ more quickly. It has slipped, and must now be re-enforced, and the same goes for penalising sealing off the ball after a tackle.”
Regarding the current hot topic of kick chase ‘access’, Doyle explained that the current interpretation wasn’t a law change, that it had been in the law book for ages and would only make things even more complicated if changed.
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“Some prominent players and coaches are not happy,” he accepted. “The arguments are that ‘access’ is leading to more box kicking, more knock-ons, more stoppages, and thus less ball-in-play time.
“While that appears to be true, and it’s impossible not to have sympathy with those views, they cannot be reasons to allow players to obstruct an opponent who is chasing the ball, or attempting to make a tackle.
“While ‘access’ as a word is relatively novel, shielding or blocking kick-chasers amounts to just good old-fashioned obstruction.
“The current interpretation is not a law change; it has been in the book for aeons. So, appeals for World Rugby to rescind it will fall on deaf ears. Such a change would require major law surgery around obstruction, and, you can bet, would be packed with plenty of unwelcome, unintended consequences.”
Reflecting on last weekend’s Investec Champions Cup action, Doyle gave his seal of approval to the rookie ref who was on the whistle for the Munster versus Gloucester match in Cork.
“In charge of the encounter was Welsh referee Ben Breakspear, a new kid on the block,” he wrote. “I hadn’t seen him before, but liked his performance. Let’s just whisper it for the moment, but it was a good outing, and he may well be a much-needed emerging talent.
“Of course both teams will have queries for him, and for the EPCR referee manager, Tony Spreadbury. But Breakspear did show good game understanding, allied to an instinctive feel for what was going on.
“These are things which no referee coach can instil – you either have it or you do not. Currently, too many officials are in the latter category.”