When Clive Woodward took over the England team in 1997, he set out a clear plan to win games. Ultimately, the last point of his plan was to “score tries” and he was clear they needed to do so from first phase possession.
In 1997 the scrum was a lot different to the way it looks now. At international level, though some coaches will be looking to win penalties at the scrum, it seems to be returning to an attacking platform.
It’s also worth remembering that in 1997 sides did not have the luxury of that extra 5m that defences now have to stand back.
While Woodward doesn’t float everyone’s coaching boat, the fact that scrums bunch their opposition defence, the space to attack remains an attractive attacking opportunity.
Our team mindset
We can count on scrum ball as a viable attacking force.
When we construct our attacking plan, we should be expecting to score with our backs from every scrum in their half. “We” is key, because your players have to be confident they can do this too.
However, it is well worth remembering the words of Gareth Edwards, the legendary Wales scrum half who scored the great Barbarians try against the All Blacks in 1973. He said the team didn’t set out to “score” when they recovered the ball in their own 22, but they had the intent to attack, break the line and make progress.
So, alongside this mindset, your team should build in a failure rate. That means, if we don’t score from this play, it’s not that the move won’t work, or we will never score from these situations.
The players on the pitch need to assess what they could do differently next time, confident that if they execute their skills at the right time, they will bust the line and perhaps go on to score.
But, these are in the moment problems. You need to do some planning ahead of the game to make sure you have some solutions already in your armoury.
Us and them
But defences are more organised than ever, aiming to close down time and space.
To breakdown a defence, players need to use good angles of running and accurate passing to exploit what little time and space there is available.
This is true of plays from a quick ruck and from a scrum. So, before you build your play book, you and your players have to be aware of their own skillset. They can then identify what needs to improve.
Key running skills
There are three basic angles of run to take a pass:
Straight
Towards the ball
Away from the ball
Each has its merits.
A straight run preserves space on the inside and outside and tends to fix defenders.
Towards the ball attacks the inside or weak shoulder of the defender.
Away from the ball takes the player away from the defender in front of them.
In all cases, a defender can simply follow the attacker, unless they’re confused because other attackers are running different lines.
An attacking backline that runs hard and in many directions creates spaces.
Use Colin Ireland’s running angles activity on page 5 to develop this.
Key passing skills
Our focus in this answer is on running lines.
Once the gap has been exposed, it needs an accurate pass to send the ball to the player in that gap.
Because the passer and the receiver are running in potential different directions, the passer needs to use the right weight and speed of pass. The calculations the brain is doing to work out relative speeds is quite something.
However, you don’t…Help your players use their feet to set up better passes by using my own better footwork activity on page 4.