Scottish Rugby Union
The
Scottish Rugby Union (SRU) is the governing body of
rugby union in Scotland.
rugby union in Scotland.
History
Personnel
Contact details
International Rugby Board
History of rugby union
Rugby union: The Play
Murrayfield Stadium
The Scottish Football Union (SFU) was founded in 1873 and was a founding member of the International Rugby Board in 1886 with Ireland and Wales. England joined in 1890. In 1924 the SFU changed its name to become the Scottish Rugby Union. International games were played at Inverleith from 1899 to 1925 when Murrayfield was opened.
The SRU owns Murrayfield Stadium, which is the main home ground of the Scottish national team, though in 2004 international rugby games were played at Hampden Park in Glasgow and McDiarmid Park in Perth, as part of the SRU's campaign to reach out to new audiences outside the traditional rugby areas.
When the Heineken Cup was suggested SRU officials were concerned that Scottish club sides could not compete against the best teams from France and England and that centrally funded so-called 'super-district' teams might do better.
The four traditional districts—the South (renamed Border Reivers), Edinburgh, Glasgow and the North & Midlands (rebranded as Caledonia Reds)—were given the go-ahead to take part in Europe. For the first two seasons, players were still released to play for their clubs in domestic competition, but eventually the districts became full-time operations.
Then financial difficulties—the SRU's high debt, partly as a result of the redevelopment of Murrayfield—called for retrenchment. After two seasons, financial difficulties forced the SRU to merge the four teams into two. Edinburgh merged with the Border Reivers to form a team to be known as Edinburgh Reivers. Glasgow merged with Caledonian to form a team to be known as Glasgow Caledonian.
The Borders was resurrected in 2002 and joined the second season of the Celtic League. As a consequence Edinburgh Reivers became simply Edinburgh Rugby and Glasgow became Glasgow Rugby. In 2005, all three teams adopted new names. The Borders readopted the name Border Reivers, Edinburgh became Edinburgh Gunners, and Glasgow became Glasgow Warriors. Caledonia will be re-established when the SRU believe financial circumstances permit.
Phil Anderton was the Chief Executive Officer (resigned January 2005), and on July 14th 2005 a new Scottish Rugby Board was created. Allan Munro is the new chairman, with Fred McLeod (deputy), Tom Inglis and Brian Kennedy alongside as non-executive directors.
The President since 2005 is now Andy Irvine, the former great player.
The head coach of the Scotland national rugby union team is currently Frank Hadden, who was appointed following the departure of Matt Williams after the 2004/2005 season.
The Scottish Rugby Union plc
Murrayfield
Edinburgh EH12 5PJ
Scotland, UK
Tel: 0131 346 5000
Fax: 0131 346 5001
E-mail: feedback@sru.org.uk
Murrayfield
Edinburgh EH12 5PJ
Scotland, UK
Tel: 0131 346 5000
Fax: 0131 346 5001
E-mail: feedback@sru.org.uk
The International Rugby Board (IRB), headquartered in Dublin, Ireland, is the world governing and law-making body for the game of rugby union (as opposed to rugby league—see the respective entries for differences between the two). There are currently 95 full members and 8 associate members.
The Executive Council meets twice a year. It consists of eight Unions with two seats each: Scotland, Ireland, Wales, England, Australia, New Zealand, South Africa and France. Four unions have one seat each: Argentina, Canada, Italy and Japan as does FIRA–AER. The full membership meets at a General Meeting which is convened every two years. Regional meetings are held at regular intervals. Its president is Syd Millar (Ireland), since November 2003.
The IRB controls several tournaments: the Rugby Union World Cup, the Women's Rugby World Cup, Rugby World Cup Sevens, IRB World Sevens Series, Under 21 World Cup, Under 19 World Championship, and the Super Powers Cup.
The IRB have recently released £18.6 million of funding over three years for tier two nations Canada, the USA, Japan, Romania, Fiji, Samoa and Tonga. Argentina will also receive additional support to enable it to retain its tier one status. The money, built up from successful World Cups, was released following a report commissioned by the IRB highlighting the growing disparity between tier one and tier two nations. (see IRB statement). This is in addition to the £10-12 million it normally gives out grants and tournament costs. The emphasis is on three areas infrastructure, high performance units and cross border competitions.
Early history
The schism between the Football Association and Rugby Football
The forming of the First Rugby Union
First international game
The forming of the International Rugby Football Board
Evolution of modern rules
The schism between union and league
World War I
Interesting times 1931 – 1947
The Rugby Union World Cup
The Professional Era
Timeline of the foundation of national rugby unions/federations
The history of the International Rugby Board
Important international competitions
List of Rugby Union World Cups
List of Rugby and the Olympic Games
Memorable Games
Memorable Tours
Rugby School
Playing football has a long tradition in England
and football had probably been played at Rugby School for two hundred
years before three boys published the first set of written rules in
1845. The rules had always been determined by the pupils and not the
masters and they were frequently modified with each new intake. Rules
changes, such as the legality of carrying or running with the ball,
were often agreed shortly before the commencement of a game. There were
thus no formal rules for football during the time William Webb Ellis
was at the school (1816-1825) and the legendary story of the boy "who
with a fine disregard for the rules as played in his time, first took
the ball in his arms and ran with it" in 1823 is apocryphal. The story
first appeared in 1876, some four years after the death of Webb Ellis,
and is attributed to a local antiquarian and former Rugbeian Matthew
Bloxam. Bloxam was not a comtemporary of Webb Ellis and vaguely quoted
an unnamed person as informing him of the incident that had supposedly
happened 53 years earlier. The story has been dismissed as unlikely
since an official investigation by the Old Rugbeian Society in 1895.
However, the trophy for the Rugby Union World Cup is named "Webb Ellis"
in his honour (as is Ellis Park in Johannesburg a major international
rugby union stadium), and a plaque at the school commemorates the
'achievement'.Rugby football has strong claims to the world's first and oldest "football club": the Guy's Hospital Football Club, formed in London in 1843, by old boys from Rugby School. Around the anglosphere, a number of other clubs formed to play games based on the Rugby School rules. One of these, Dublin University Football Club, founded in 1854, has arguably become the world's oldest surviving football club in any code. The Blackheath Rugby Club, in London, founded in 1858, is the oldest surviving non-university rugby club.
The schism between the Football Association and Rugby Football
The Football Association was formed at the Freemason’s Tavern, Great Queen Street, on Lincoln Inn Fields, London October 26, 1863 with the intention to frame a code of laws that would embrace the best and most acceptable points of all the various methods of play under the one heading of "football".
At the beginning of the fourth meeting attention was drawn to the fact that a number of newspapers had recently published the Cambridge Rules of 1863. The Cambridge rules differed from the draft FA rules in two significant areas; namely 'running with the ball' and 'hacking' (kicking an opponent in the shins). The two contentious draft rules were as follows:
IX.
A player shall be entitled to run with the ball towards his
adversaries' goal if he makes a fair catch, or catches the ball on the
first bound; but in case of a fair catch, if he makes his mark he shall
not run.
X.
If any player shall run with the ball towards his adversaries' goal,
any player on the opposite side shall be at liberty to charge, hold,
trip or hack him, or to wrest the ball from him, but no player shall be
held and hacked at the same time.
At the fifth meeting a motion was proposed that these two rules be expunged from the FA rules, F. W. Campbell a member of the Blackheath Club argued that hacking is an essential element of the 'football' and that to eliminate hacking would "do away with all the courage and pluck from the game, and I will be bound over to bring over a lot of Frenchmen who would beat you with a week’s practice". At the 6th meeting on December 8 F.W.C. withdrew the Blackheath Club explaining that the rules that the FA intended to adopt would destroy the game and all interest in it. Other rugby clubs follow this lead and did not join the Football Association.
The forming of the First Rugby Union
In December 1870 Edwin Ash, Secretary of Richmond Football Club published a letter in the papers which said, 'Those who play the rugby-type game should meet to form a code of practice as various clubs play to rules which differ from others, which makes the game difficult to play.' On January 26, 1871 a meeting attended by representatives from 22 clubs was held in London at the Pall Mall Restaurant. As a result of this meeting Rugby Football Union (RFU) was founded. Three lawyers who had been pupils at Rugby School drew up the first laws of the game which were approved in June 1871.
First international game
The first international rugby union game was played at Raeburn Place, Edinburgh on March 27, 1871 between England and Scotland. It was won by the latter, though England got revenge at the Kennington Oval, London in the following year. (See the library of the Scottish Rugby Union for details.)
The forming of the International Rugby Football Board
In 1884 England had a disagreement with Scotland over a try that England had scored but the referee disallowed citing a foul by Scotland. England argued that the referee should have played advantage and since they made the Law, if they said it was a try then it was. The International Rugby Football Board (IRFB) was formed by Scotland, Ireland and Wales in 1886 but England refused to join since they believed they should have greater representation on the board because they had a greater number of clubs. They also refused to accept that the IRFB should be the recognised law maker of the game. The IRFB agreed that the member countries would not play England until the RFU agreed to join and accept that the International Rugby Football Board (IRFB) would oversee the games between the home unions. England finally agreed to join in 1890.
Evolution of modern rules
Changes to the laws of the game have been made at various times and this process still continues today.
The number of players was reduced from twenty to fifteen-a-side in 1877
Historically, no points at all were awarded for a try, the reward being to "try" to kick the ball over the posts. Some historians record the first international between Scotland and England finishing 0-0 for this reason. The first points scoring system was created in 1889.
The balance in value between tries and conversions has changed greatly over the years. Until 1891, a try scored one point, a conversion two. For the next two years tries scored two points and conversion three, until in 1893 the modern pattern of tries scoring more was begun with three points awarded for a try, two for a kick. The number of points from a try increased to four in 1971 and five in 1992.
Penalties have been worth three points since 1891 (they previously had been worth two points). The value of the drop goal was four points between 1891 and 1948, but three points at all other times.
The goal from mark was abandoned in 1971, having been worth three points, except between 1891 and 1905 when it was worth four.
The schism between union and league
On August 29, 1895 at a meeting at the George Hotel, Huddersfield, twenty clubs from Yorkshire, Lancashire and Cheshire decided to resign from the RFU and form the Northern Rugby Football Union which from 1922 would be known as the Rugby Football League. The dispute about payment was one which at the time was also affecting soccer and cricket. Each game had to work out a compromise; Rugby was the least successful at doing this. It would be a century before union legalised payments to players and would allow players who had played a game of league (even at an amateur level) to play in a union game.
World War I
The Five Nations Championship was suspended in 1915 and it was not resumed until 1920. One hundred and thirty three international players were killed during the conflict.
Interesting times 1931 – 1947
For many years, the sport’s authorities had suspected that the governing body of French Rugby Union, the French Rugby Federation (FFR) was allowing the abuse of the rules on amateurism, and in 1931 the French Rugby Union was suspended from playing against the other nations. Looking round for an alternative, many French players turned to rugby league, which soon became the dominant game in France, particularly in the south west of the country.
In 1934 the Federation Internationale de Rugby Amateur (FIRA) was formed at the instigation of the French. It was designed to organise rugby union outside the authority of IRB. In 1990s the organisation recognised the IRB as the governing body of rugby union world wide and became in 1999 FIRA - Association of European Rugby an organisation to promote and rule over rugby union in the European area.
In 1939 the FFR was invited to send a team to the Five Nations Championship for the following season, but when war was declared, international rugby was suspended. Eighty eight international rugby union football players were killed during the conflict.
In the UK, for the duration of the World War II the ban on Rugby League players was temporarily lifted by the RFU. Many played in the eight rugby "Internationals" between England and Scotland which were played by Armed Services teams, using the rugby union code. The authorities also allowed the playing of two “Rugby League vs. Rugby Union” fixtures as fundraisers for the war effort. The Rugby League team (which included some pre-war professionals) won both matches, which were held under union rules.
After the defeat of France in 1940, the French Rugby Union authorities worked with the German collaborating Vichy regime to re-establish the dominance of their sport; Rugby League was banned and many players and officials of the sport were punished. All of the assets of the Rugby League and its clubs were handed over to the Union. The consequences of this action reverberate to this day; the assets were never returned, and although the ban on rugby league was lifted, it was prevented from calling itself “rugby” until the mid-eighties, having to use the name Jeu de Treize (Game of Thirteen, in reference to the number of player in a Rugby League side)
In 1947 the Five Nations Championship resumed with France taking part.
The Rugby Union World Cup
The first Rugby World Cup was held in New Zealand in 1987, and was won by the hosts. The Second was held in England in 1991 and was won by Australia who beat the hosts in the final. The World Cup of 1995 proved to be a turning point for the game. The competition was held in South Africa, newly readmitted from international exile. The first superstar was created when giant wing Jonah Lomu scored four tries for the All Blacks against England. The Springboks won the final, beating the All Blacks 15-12 thanks to Joel Stransky's boot. South African President Nelson Mandela, dressed not in a suit but in the Springbok jersey, long a symbol of apartheid, with the name and number (7) of South Africa's captain Francois Pienaar, gave Pienaar the William Webb Ellis Trophy.
This had shown the commercial potential for the game, and breakaway competitions were being formed, thus forcing the hand of the authorities to declare the game open.
The Professional Era
On August 26, 1995 the International Rugby (Football) Board declared Rugby Union an "open" game and thus removed all restrictions on payments or benefits to those connected with the game. It did this because of a committee conclusion that to do so was the only way to end the hypocrisy of Shamateurism and to keep control of rugby union (there were rumours that Rupert Murdoch was planning to finance a Southern Hemisphere professional league).
The rugby union authorities of the time hoped that as players could now play in either code, in the long term most of the sponsorship and interest would gravitate away from league to union. The union clubs and national teams in Australia and England stand to gain the most, as they are able to call upon talent in terms of ideas, players and support from the League heartlands. Conversely, the ending of sanctions against the playing of rugby league led to some amateur union players moving the other way and sampling the ‘other code’.
The move to professionalism was not without its problems, and the many smaller unions have struggled (both financially and in playing terms) to compete with the major nations since the start of the open era. In England whilst some teams flourished in the proressional era others such as Richmond, Wakefield, Orrell, Waterloo and London Scottish found the going much harder and have either folded or dropped down the leagues.
Year the National Rugby unions
were founded:
1871 (England) Rugby Football Union (RFU)
1873 Scottish Rugby Union
1874 Southern (Australian) Rugby Union (later New South Wales Rugby Union)
1879 Irish Rugby Football Union (a merger of two Irish unions both formed in 1874)
1880 Welsh Rugby Union
1883 Northern (Australian) Rugby Union (later Queensland Rugby Union)
1889 South African Rugby Board
1892 New Zealand Rugby Football Union
1895 Rhodesia Rugby Football Union (Zimbabwe RFU after 1980)
1899 Argentinian Rugby Union
1913 Fijian Rugby Union
1919 French Rugby Federation
1923 Spanish Rugby Federation
1923 Tongan Rugby Football Union
1923 Samoan Rugby Football Union
1926 Japanese Rugby Football Union
1928 Italian Rugby Federation
1931 Romanian Rugby Federation
1949 Australian Rugby Union
1951 Uruguay Rugby Union
1961 Cote d’Ivoire Rugby Federation
1964 Georgian Rugby Union
1965 Rugby Canada (founded as Canadian Rugby Union)
1975 USA Rugby (founded as United States of America Rugby Football Union)
1990 Namibian Rugby Union
1992 South African Rugby Union (founded as South Africa Rugby Football Union, a merger of the white South African Rugby Board and the non-racial South African Rugby Union; adopted current name in 2005)
The history of the International Rugby Board
• 1884 England had a disagreement with Scotland over a try with England arguing that as they made the Law, if they said it was a try then it was. There was a messy dispute which pulled in the Irish and Welsh Unions on the side of Scotland.
• 1886 International Rugby Football Board (IRFB) was founded by the Rugby Unions of Ireland, Scotland and Wales.
• 1890 England joins the IRFB and agrees that in future the IRFB would oversee the games between the home unions.
• 1930 It was agreed that all future matches were to be played under the laws of the IRFB.
• 1949 Australia, New Zealand and South Africa became members of the IRFB.
• 1978 France became a member of the IRFB.
• 1986 Canada became a member of the IRFB.
• 1987 Argentina, Fiji, Italy, Japan, Romania, Tonga, USA and Zimbabwe became members of the IRFB.
• 1988 Cote d’Ivoire, Spain and Samoa became members of the IRFB.
• 1989 Uruguay became a member of the IRFB.
• 1990 Namibian became a member of the IRFB.
• 1991 Georgia became a member of the IRFB.
• 1998 The International Rugby Football Board dropped the ‘F’ to become the IRB.
Important international competitions
• 1883 First Four Nations (Home nations) Championship between England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales.
• 1910 The Four Nations becomes Five when France joins.
• 1987 First Rugby World Cup.
• 1996 The Tri Nations Series begins between Australia, New Zealand and South Africa.
• 2000 The Five Nations becomes The Six Nations Championship when Italy joins.
List of Rugby Union World Cups
1987 New Zealand defeated France 29-9 at Eden Park, Auckland, in the first Rugby World Cup held in Australia and New Zealand.
1991 Australia defeated England in the final 12-6 at Twickenham, London, in the second Rugby Union World Cup held in British Isles and France.
1995 South Africa defeated New Zealand in the final 15-12 at Ellis Park, Johannesburg (after extra time) in the third Rugby Union World Cup held in South Africa.
1999 Australia defeated France in the final 35-12 at the Millennium Stadium, Cardiff in the fourth Rugby World Cup held in the British Isles and France.
2003 England defeated Australia in the final 20-17 at Stadium Australia, Sydney (after extra time) in the fifth Rugby Union World Cup held in Australia.
List of Rugby and the Olympic Games
1900 Rugby is played at the Olympic Games for the first time. Two countries enter. France defeated Germany 25-16.
1908 Rugby is played at the Olympic Games for the second time. Two countries enter. Australia defeated Great Britain 32-3.
1920 Rugby is played at the Olympic Games for the third time. Two countries enter. USA defeated France 8-0.
1924 Rugby is played at the Olympic Games for the fourth and final time. Three countries enter Romania and France & USA. USA defeated the other two.
Memorable Games
1973 the Barbarians defeat All Blacks at Cardiff Arms Park in "that game" (video of game available under the Millennium Stadium)
1995 Jonah Lomu scores 4 tries for the All Blacks against England in the 1995 Rugby World Cup semifinals.
1995 Joel Stransky scores an extra-time drop goal for South Africa to defeat the All Blacks in the World Cup final.
1999 France upsets the heavily-favoured All Blacks in the world cup semi finals.
2000 New Zealand narrowly defeats Australia at Stadium Australia in a game widely regarded as one of the greatest ever.
2003 Jonny Wilkinson of England kicked a drop goal in the dying seconds of extra-time to defeat the Wallabies in the 2003 Rugby World Cup
Memorable Tours
1925 All Blacks tour of Britain, France, and Canada. The New Zealanders remained undefeated throughout the tour, earning the title 'The Invincibles'.
1956 Springboks tour of New Zealand. South Africa suffer their first ever test series loss.
1971 Lions tour of Australia and New Zealand. The greatest Lions side of all, and the only Lions team to have ever won a test series in New Zealand.
1974 Lions tour of South Africa – the notorious 99 call
1981 Springboks tour of New Zealand.
.The game is closely related to rugby league. The main points of difference are the number of players per side (league has 13, union 15), the number of tackles allowed before a change of possession (league is limited to six, union has no limit), and league's use of the play the ball rule.
The International Rugby Board (IRB), founded in 1886, governs the sport and also publishes the game's laws.
Method of play
Scoring
Set-pieces
Restart kicks
Tackle
Ruck
Maul
Scrum
Line-out
Team positions
Method of play
As noted above, rugby union differs from association football in that the hands can be employed to move the ball. However, a player can only pass the ball backwards or laterally (i.e. not forward) to another player, or kick it. This means that the majority of progress made by an attacking team occurs through a leap frog cycle of passing the ball, running to make ground, being tackled and repeating this process. Each of these cycles (greatly simplified) is called a phase of play. The aim of rugby is to score more points than the opposition. Teams score in several ways:
Scoring
Touching the ball down, in a controlled fashion, with downward pressure from any point on the body from the waist to the neck on or over the opponents' goal line, including the base of the posts, which is considered to be part of the goal line (a try, worth 5 points). A penalty try can be awarded if, following an incident of foul play, in the judgment of the referee a try would have been scored had the foul not occurred. The try got its name because originally the touching down of the ball only gave you a "try" at scoring by successfully kicking for post, which were the only points scored if the kick was good.
After scoring a try, the scoring team attempts a conversion: a player takes a kick at goal in line with where the touch-down occurred. Scoring the goal earns 2 points.
Kicking the ball above the crossbar and between the uprights of a large 'H'-shaped set of posts. This may either occur from a penalty kick or kicked from the hand during play. In the latter case, the ball must strike the ground before being kicked (a drop goal). Both types of goal score 3 points.
Set-pieces
Various set-pieces occur in play, principally:
Restart kicks
At the start of each half, one side kicks off. One side, determined following the toss of a coin, takes a drop kick from the middle of the centre line to start the first half. The ball must travel at least 10 metres into the opposition half. The other team kicks off the second half. The kicking side frequently kicks the ball high and aims to drop it just over the 10 metre minimum, which is marked by a dashed line across the pitch. This tactic gives their players time to chase the lobbed ball and hope to catch it before the defenders can do so. Alternatively the kick may be a long kick deep into opposition territory, sacrificing the chance to regain possession for territorial gain.
Similarly, there is also a 22 metre drop-out. This is awarded if the attacking side is responsible for sending the ball into the in-goal area, but instead of their player grounding the ball and scoring a try it is first grounded by a defender. If the ball is kicked into the in-goal area by the attackers and instead of being grounded there by either side it continues, under its own momentum, through the in-goal area and crosses the dead-ball line, then the defenders have the option of choosing either a 22 drop out or a scrum at the place where the attackers kicked the ball. The 22 metre drop out is taken at any point along (or behind) the 22 metre line.
Note: in rugby union, unlike association football (soccer), the lines bordering the field of play are themselves regarded as out of play. Thus, a player standing on but not over the touch line is regarded to be "in touch".
Tackle
A player may tackle an opposing player who has
the ball by holding him while bringing him to ground. If a ball carrier
is held by an opposition player but still has forward momentum he may
continue to slide over the goal-line and score a try. One knee touching
the ground, or the ball touching the ground, is sufficient for a ball
carrier to be deemed to be grounded.A tackled player must release the ball, and the tackler must release him and move away, allowing the ball to become available, or for a ruck to form. If the ball-carrier is held but is not on the ground, then it is not a tackle and a maul may form.
Players will often deliberately go to ground rather than allow a maul to form, to take advantage of the rules governing rucks. Once a player has gone to the ground and at least two others players, one from each side, are rucking (usually by locking shoulders and pushing each other, in an attempt to secure positioning), and the ball is on the ground, a ruck is formed. No player can advance past the back foot of the members of their team unless they are joining the ruck from behind the back foot. If a player does so and interferes with the play, for example by touching the ball, the result would be an offside call. The ball is recovered from a ruck when a player coming from his own side of the ruck from an onside position is able to heel the ball to a player behind the ruck who can then either make a run or pass the ball from the base of the ruck. A ball may not be handled in the ruck.
In a maul, the team not in possession is allowed
to actively compete for the ball by trying to wrestle it from the
carrier. Therefore, it is easier to retain possession of the ball in a
ruck (in which the opposition cannot touch the ball) than in a maul,
and a ruck will often allow a team to recover the ball quickly and move
it on so as to launch another attack before the defenders have had time
to re-organise.There are a number of laws governing how to tackle, the most notable of which are that the tackler cannot tackle above the shoulder (the neck and head are out of bounds), and the tackler has to attempt to wrap his arms around the player being tackled to complete the tackle. It is illegal to trip a player using feet or legs, but hands may be used (this being referred to as a tap-tackle or ankle-tap).
Ruck
A ruck is a contest for possession. Once a
tackle has grounded a player, he must release the ball and try to move
out of the way, as must the tackler. The first player(s) arriving from
either side may pick up the ball; however as soon as two players, one
from each side, bind together — usually by locking shoulders as they
face each other — with the ball at their feet they have formed a ruck,
as more players arrive they may join the ruck, but must do so from the
last foot (also known as the "gate") of their own side. In a ruck no
player may use his hands to win the ball, instead each side attempts to
push the other side back, and players use their feet to hook the ball
backwards towards their own side — an action known as "rucking the
ball" where it will be picked up by the scrum-half or half-back who
waits behind the ruck. Players in a ruck may not deliberately go to
ground themselves. If the ball becomes trapped in a ruck, the referee
awards a scrum to the side going forward.Most infringements occur in rucks. Players may seek to slow down the speed of the recycling of the opposition's ball or speed up their own by using their hands illegally, or by lying over the ball, or going to ground deliberately. Such infringements result in penalties.
If the attacking team loses possession by legal means, either because of the attacking player dropping the ball or a defending player stealing it, then the ball is said to have been "turned over". After a turn over play carries on as before, except that the attacker/defender roles of the two teams are switched.
Maul
A maul is formed if the ball carrier is held up after a tackle and one player from each side binds onto him and tries either to rip the ball away or push him forwards. Once a maul has formed other players may join in but, as in a ruck, they must do so from the "gate" on their own side. If the maul stops moving forward, then the referee awards a scrum to the side not in possession when the maul began. The tactic of the rolling maul occurs when mauls are set up, and the ball is passed backwards through the players hands to one at the rear, who rolls off the side to create a new maul. This tactic can be extremely effective in gaining ground and takes great skill and technique to both do properly and to try to prevent. It's a tactic most commonly used when the attacking side is inside their opponents' 22. It is illegal, on safety grounds, to pull down a maul, so that players fall to the ground. Referees are aware that many sides will try to stop a maul by deliberately collapsing it and will watch carefully for this illegal tactic.
Line-outWhen the ball goes into touch (i.e. Outside of the area of play) the referee calls a line-out. The forwards of each team line up a metre apart between 5m and 15m from the touchline. If the ball went out from a penalty, the side who gained the penalty throws the ball in, if not the other team does so. Both sides compete for the ball, and some players may lift their teammates.
A referee controls the match, usually assisted by two touch judges.
Team positions
A rugby union team consists of 15 players, eight forwards numbered 1 to 8, and seven backs, numbered 9 to 15. Depending upon the competition, there may be up to seven replacements (substitutes).
The main role of the forwards is to gain and retain possession of the ball. They take part in set pieces of the scrum and the line-out. Generally, forwards are larger than the backs, which makes them stronger but slower. Forwards also have a role in taking the ball forwards, but generally do so by driving into the opposing forwards.
The role of the backs is to move the game forward by running or kicking the ball. The scrum-half will gain possession of the ball from the forwards and usually feed it to the fly half (no.10) who then controls how the attacking team will proceed. The backline will tend to score its tries by focussing on the tactical placement of players, creating holes in the opposition defence line. A successful backline will cause the opposition to commit too many players at strategic points allowing for space to open up for the faster, outside backs (wingers and fullback).
| Positions on the Rugby field |
||||||
| 1 Loosehead Prop |
2 Hooker |
3 Tighthead Prop |
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| 4 Lock |
5 Lock |
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| 6 Blindside Flanker |
8 Number |
7 Openside Flanker |
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| 9 Scrum-Half |
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| 10 Fly-half |
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| 12 Inside centre |
||||||
| 13 Outside centre |
||||||
| 11 Left wing |
14 Right wing |
|||||
| 15 Fullback |
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The following diagram locates the various positions in the 15-man team. All members of the starting 15 wear jerseys numbered from 1 to 15 and keyed to their positions (though alternatives exist); see rugby union positions and rugby union numbering schemes for more information. The first eight players, known as forwards or the pack, play in the scrum. The remaining seven players play as the backs.
Murrayfield Stadium in Edinburgh (capacity 67,500) is the home of Scottish Rugby and a name known throughout the rugby world. Apart from rugby union, it sometimes hosts football games, American football, rugby league etc.
The stadium has also seen performances from major bands like David Bowie, U2 and Red Hot Chili Peppers, and in July 2005 hosted the final Live 8 concert, Edinburgh 50,000 - The Final Push. It is used by Jevohah's Witnesses for an annual gathering
History
The SFU bought some land and built the first Murrayfield Stadium which was opened on 21 March 1925. (Previously internationals had been played at Inverleith). The first visitors were England, who Scotland beat to win their first Five Nations Championship Grand Slam.
During the Second World War the ground at Murrayfield was offered to the nation and was taken over by the Royal Army Service Corps and used as a supply depot. During the war years the armed forces sports authorities managed to arrange two England v. Scotland Services Internationals each year, on a home-and-away basis. Scotland's home matches were played at Inverleith for the first two years with a return to Murrayfield in 1944 after that ground's derequisition.
The ground was home to what is believe to have been the largest ever attendance for a rugby union match, with 104,000 watching Scotland play Wales in 1975, many more (mostly Welsh) fans were not allowed into the stadium on safety grounds.
Contact
details
The Scottish Rugby Union
Murrayfield
Edinburgh,lothian EH12 5PJ
Scotland, UK
Tel: (+44)0131 346 5000
Fax: (+44)0131 346 5001
E-mail: feedback@sru.org.uk
The Scottish Rugby Union
Murrayfield
Edinburgh,lothian EH12 5PJ
Scotland, UK
Tel: (+44)0131 346 5000
Fax: (+44)0131 346 5001
E-mail: feedback@sru.org.uk