I agree with this wholeheartedly. Even by the 1980s, most players had worked out "spoiling tactics" at scrums to cause delays/disrupt the scrum, and they were really hard to police even then, and coaching methods are a lot more sophisticated now.

As an example, here's a scrum that formed in the last minute of the 1983 CC semi final between Featherstone and Bradford (starts at around 33:15). As a Fev fan whose team was winning I thought it was a thing of beauty at the time, but honestly it was a proper mess and by no means unusual, my strongest memory of scrums in the 1980 is of constant similar collapses and a bit of an arbitrary wrestle for the ball from the scrum halves.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uu87pBQlq7E&t=430s

I agree with this wholeheartedly. Even by the 1980s, most players had worked out "spoiling tactics" at scrums to cause delays/disrupt the scrum, and they were really hard to police even then, and coaching methods are a lot more sophisticated now.

As an example, here's a scrum that formed in the last minute of the 1983 CC semi final between Featherstone and Bradford (starts at around 33:15). As a Fev fan whose team was winning I thought it was a thing of beauty at the time, but honestly it was a proper mess and by no means unusual, my strongest memory of scrums in the 1980 is of constant similar collapses and a bit of an arbitrary wrestle for the ball from the scrum halves.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uu87pBQlq7E&t=430s