This 'hybrid game' will never take off.

For one, South Africa would never buy into it. There is hardly any league in SA, and RU is a key part of their culture, they retreated into their own domestic RU when the Springboks were banned from international competition during apartheid, and if they tried to make a hybrid game changing the rules, the South Africans are far too conservative and traditional for that so they would just retreat into playing RU again. And you can only make a hybrid game work if you stamp out RU and RL as separate sports otherwise fans and even players will just go back to the original codes.

I said on a thread the other day the a hybrid game would only ever work if all the clubs and all governing bodies bought into the idea. That includes the ametuer game.

Hence why it will probably never happen.

I would suspect that if Super league clubs were invited into a Hybrid game, it would end up reverting toward union before long. Essentially, somewhere along the line the rugby league clubs would get royally bummed.

IL isn't going to take on a Union squad. They are 22 men a game plus others for a full squad. They cost an absolute fortune. Orrell tried a Union at the JJB and they had around 700 watching.

Sam's game with Union is to raise his profile, he and the club earn some money and his agents attempt to gain him a national brand sponsor if possible. Maybe IL sees the best way of getting Sam to stay in League is to create a Sam Tomkins "brand" rather than a Wigan Rugby brand.

It may be Sam's first jaunt into Union but I don't think it will be his last during his 5 year deal with us.
One thing we do know about IL and that he way ahead of the game. He's that far ahead he's in danger of leaving many of us behind and not on his wavelength at all.
I do trust IL with Wigan RL and to do the best for the club come what may!

Firstly I do not think the forming of an RU club is anywhere near the thinking of IL or anyone at Wigan. There is a Wigan RU and they show there is little support for the sport in Wigan. Certainly not enough for a top level club.

Secondly I think it is highly unlikely a single unified code of rugby will ever happen. The major barrier to this is the RFU and the commercial success of the RU international scene. For the codes to ever merge it would require the fans to be happy to stick with it on both sides of the divide. This would mean that neither code would have to see very much change to the rules and patterns of the games by switching from RL/RU to hybrid rugby. Fans of both codes like the elements of their own code that make it distinct. They would have to be pretty much similar in the first place to allow a merged code to work. Anyway getting back to my point about the RFU and international RU. Many of the changes to the rules after the forming of the NU in 1895 came about in order to improve the game as a spectacle. All clubs in NU were now paying money to players and had to earn that money. To do this they had to attract and keep spectators and numbers were falling. Reducing player numbers, abolishing lineouts and rucking and mauling and reducing points values of goals all made for a more attractive spectacle to attract spectators (and money). NU(RL) had no international aspect originally and has always been club focused so clubs' motivation to alter and improve the spectacle made it happen. RU is and has always been international focused as all clubs were amateur and so essentially were just mates playing and feeding into national sides. Since becoming pro (putting aside shamateurism) the RU clubs have faced and still face those same pressures that the NU clubs did 116 years ago. They may (already or in the near future) want to develop a more attractive spectacle to get more fans through the gate. To achieve this they may wish to alter the rules to get rid of some of the elements that are untidy such as contested scrums or to alter the scoring system to produce more emphasis on tries as NU(RL) did. However the RFU would have the say on this, international RU [iis[/i popular and internationals already have very large crowds. The RFU make the money they need and so will say that they do not need to change the rules as many people will watch it as it is. The RFU do not need a more appealing spectacle so won't change the rules and the codes will stay very different. The rules of both will remain too different to be easily synchronised. So RL and RU fans alike would bemoan the loss of features of their code and any new additions to rules too. They would not support it and it would wither

Lets be honest, we like our sport for what it is.

We don't need to start changing things and adding union rules. The only things I'd take from union is the media coverage and money

Wouldn't mind the contested scrum.

got to admit I kind of miss the contested scrum.the scrum we have now is a joke

I'd rather we took a line out than have the scrum we have now. It's a waste of time.

The scrum can be contested. Teams just choose not to.

And when they do how often does the ref let them get away with it?.

If you want contested scrums you have to get them set properly and the feed would need to be straight. If you do that you get what you see in RU which is quite often three goes to set the scrum then a penalty because the ref loses patience. Now that [iis[/i a waste of time.

If you took a line out instead then teams would kick to touch virtually every time on the last tackle because they would have a chance at getting the ball back which completely defeats the object of the turnover in possession which you get with a scrum. It would change the nature of the game completely.

This is true and something I think people forget when thinking about adding line outs or contested scrums for example. We lost them for a reason and IMO that reason is still valid today. Probably more so as we can see how some RU clubs struggle to attract crowds and also because as pro athletes things like contested scrums are downright dangerous given the power of professional players



There is conflict in RU circles over the way the game is played given the way the rules allow it to be played. Watch the Super 15 and there is almost tacit agreement to play the game in an expansive way. Come the internationals and this goes out of the window. The clubs and the game will IMO change somewhat (changes like lifting in the lineout to make it legal to reduce penalties) but it will be a long time before it naturally evolves to a better game but I think you underestimate the desire of the clubs for change.

If they could sort the scrum out it would be worthwhile IMO ..as they stand now you might as well give a tap penalty.

Then we'd be playing union anyway

. Contested scrums as in RU take a long time to set in the first place to try and make them safe and there are lots of infringements and not just technical ones but ones where the ref blows up because of safety issues.

Scrums get collapsed and often they will get wheeled around. If one side is superior at scrummaging then you see much more of this along with things like one of the forwards pop up because he doesn't like the pasting he is getting in the scrum which also can result in a penalty and so on. The whole thing can take several minutes and just reduces the time the ball is in play considerably. The setting, re-setting and high penalty count is all a consequence of the power and fitness of the players today and trying to balance that with safety.

I think the only thing you could do in RL is feed the ball in down the middle and allow the hookers to strike for it but have the forwards not push and so just hold the scrum steady. I am not sure its worth the bother since we seem to have evolved our game to actually want the team with the feed to get possession.

Contested scrums are ridiculous, if the other team drops the ball why should they be given a chance to win it back? I would scrap scrums all together and have tap restarts, it would speed the game up aswell.

I feel that silly contested scrums and lineouts are in our past because thats where they belong. RL's strength from the start was that it looked forward not backwards. I suspect that IL can see the writing on the wall for RL, and that Union is struggling too. Any kind of melding of the two is years away, arguements about how it should be played, and even bringing the seasons together would be a nightmare. Then you have the Aussie question, but if we tie up in some way with the RFU, then Aussie RL would have to stand alone, and it probably can, does it need a World Cup? Maybe IL thinks that a "Wigan" brand should dominate "Rugby" in this country, with an aim of bringing the two together. Oh to be a fly on the wall at some of the meetings that may, or not be taking place...

I am biased but we have a superb product and that was echoed by many at the 4 nations fans forum including the players and media types, however what is required is good marketing of the game in this country, Wigan again IMO have set the standard on this side of things and Simon Collinson has done a superb job by looking at what other countries I.E Australia etc do in terms of marketing the game.

IL has also done a great job in repairing the links between Wigan and the RFL as he once said there was some damage done by MO & Co previously, and with ILs knowledge and business acumen the RFL would do very well to use ILs skills to bolster the game throughout the country.

We also need to stop a lot of the so called RL media muppets slagging the game off and always looking to put the game down in some trivial manner.

I am not saying everything is rosie in the RL garden but with the right people and the right culture in the game at the highest level, RL is very well placed to become a much wider supported game than it currently is in the UK

Let's not forget that both Union and League started out as the same game. League is the game that has changed and evolved to suit the needs of players, supporters and professionalism. If it suited, then league would have 15 players, line outs and loads of kicking - but changes were made not to be different to Union but to improve the game. Meanwhile, for 100 years Union virtually remained the same. Rugby Union was definitely not a game to be considered either as a spectator sport or professional. During this time and especially in England, there was a prejudice against rugby league that kept working class people away from the toffs and that suited them fine.

Today Union is running around in circles trying to deal with the professional era and England is in the biggest mess, despite having by far the largest playing numbers and the richest Union. The biggest concern in Union is not to improve the game but to not look like or do anything that can be construed as League, and so long as that carries on they will have the only game where the main strategy involves wellying the ball off the pitch as often as they can.

I live in Bath from the moment and £38 will buy me a seat in a temporary scaffold stand without a cover at the Recreation Ground and 80 minutes of boredom, not to mention no atmosphere and a crowd more intent on yacking back Blackthorn Cider than taking any interest in the rugby. And Bath play an entertaining brand of rugby! Locally, rugby clubs in this city find it virtually impossible to raise teams at 14s 16s and 18s because the boarding schools have the monopoly (plenty of them round here) and whilst there are some exceptions in England, it is fair to say that Union is still a game for the rich and "privileged".

As for merging or hybrid versions? League is genetically too far from Union. There is no point going back into the dark ages to meet up with an unwilling and incompatible ancestor! I get the feeling that whilst they consider it fine to raid the rugby league larder for talent now and again, I don't think the Union lot are ready for the Brigantes calling in for coffee and cakes in Bath just yet!

Agreed, and this really made me giggle.....

How would the brigantes go down at Twickers during a Rah Rah international ?

That is what I was on about Dave..if we want the team feeding to get the ball to speed things up..then as I said before just award a tap penalty.

Badly.

There's one glaring fault with the idea of a hybrid game, Union can call the shots, they can adapt their game to make it more entertaining and say join us or take the high road.

Can you really see the RFL having any negotiating power if high level talks took place, we've already seen with Sam how Wigan and the governing body have to put a positive spin on something that seemed absolutely inconceivable only a few weeks back.