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A Field Guide To The Worst, Most Ineffective, Not To Mention Dangerous Tackling Techniques In Rugby

By Lee Calvert
This Is Not A Good Tackle

Tackling is one of rugby’s core skills, but it’s not as easy as it sounds. Rugby anthropologist Lee Calvert has identified and given name to ten of the most common bad tackling styles seen in amateur games around the world.

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1. Statue: Feet planted like they have been welded to the floor, arms locked in action figure position waiting to meet the ball carrier head on. This position is usually adopted when the carrier is still about twelve metres away, so is only of use for tackling forwards who don’t understand the words nor the concept of “side step”.

2. M.M.Apocalypse: One bloke on the team, usually your openside, will be a UFC fan who has started learning Jiu Jitsu or some other form of MMA. He will use this to grip and spin the ball-carrier in such a way that both end up on the ground with their spines intertwined like a particularly disturbing scene from a torture-porn-horror movie. Pretending to be injured not applicable in this case.

3. Flopwave: The purpose of the side-on tackle is taking the runner at the hip as he passes, using the ring of steel hand lock to grip his running legs and bring him down. However, that is for competent players – in the hands of the amateur player this more closely resembles flopping against the ball carrier as he passes and dangling one arm in front of his legs as he boots it out of the way. Usually followed by tackler pretending to be injured.

4. Teeth Relocator: You’ve just expended all of your energy chasing down a break, you make one last-ditch dive to tackle him from behind, but instead you end up falling towards his legs and he rearranges your dentistry with his studs. If by some stroke of your luck your teeth do survive intact, pretend to be injured while you suck in air like you are living in an airlock.

5. Ghost Tackle: One player never shuts up about defence – he calls the defensive line-up, talks about gaps and patterns, and calls you out, along the lines of “Oi! Me and you are hitting that Big Bastard next time he carries, SET! IN!” You move up with him, but he pulls out just before contact, leaving you to wear the full, hideous extent of the aforementioned Big Bastard’s carry. He returns to the line to shout some more and rerun the whole sequence with someone else while you pretend to be injured. One day, someone will watch him closely and realise that despite being “the defensive leader” he hasn’t actually made a tackle since 2009.

6. Windpipe: If all else fails, the throat punch straight arm will get you there.

7. Trip: “He’s stepping left, no right, no left, yes left, no right! Bollocks to it!” Flying leg scissors follows, then pretending to be injured, obviously.

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8. Ankle-flap: Like an ankle tap, expect it misses and the tackler ends up on the floor looking like a mole desperately trying to dig itself back underground. Again, usually followed by pretending to be injured.

9. The Hinderer: You all know a player who has used this tackle for the entirety of their rugby career. The tackle that does not bring anyone down, merely hinders their forward movement slightly. Pretending to be injured is a large part of the aftermath of this.

10. Truck & Trailer: Front-on tackle turns into a Hinderer, but the tackler manages to grip the bottom of the back of the carrier’s shirt and pulls down. Carrier keeps running, tackler is pulled along for a bit then falls into a Teeth Relocator or an Ankle Flap, then pretends to be injured. It’s more beautiful than ballet.

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Jon 6 hours ago
Jake White: Are modern rugby players actually better?

This is the problem with conservative mindsets and phycology, and homogenous sports, everybody wants to be the same, use the i-win template. Athlete wise everyone has to have muscles and work at the gym to make themselves more likely to hold on that one tackle. Do those players even wonder if they are now more likely to be tackled by that player as a result of there “work”? Really though, too many questions, Jake. Is it better Jake? Yes, because you still have that rugby of ole that you talk about. Is it at the highest International level anymore? No, but you go to your club or checkout your representative side and still engage with that ‘beautiful game’. Could you also have a bit of that at the top if coaches encouraged there team to play and incentivized players like Damian McKenzie and Ange Capuozzo? Of course we could. Sadly Rugby doesn’t, or didn’t, really know what direction to go when professionalism came. Things like the state of northern pitches didn’t help. Over the last two or three decades I feel like I’ve been fortunate to have all that Jake wants. There was International quality Super Rugby to adore, then the next level below I could watch club mates, pulling 9 to 5s, take on the countries best in representative rugby. Rugby played with flair and not too much riding on the consequences. It was beautiful. That largely still exists today, but with the world of rugby not quite getting things right, the picture is now being painted in NZ that that level of rugby is not required in the “pathway” to Super Rugby or All Black rugby. You might wonder if NZR is right and the pathway shouldn’t include the ‘amateur’, but let me tell you, even though the NPC might be made up of people still having to pull 9-5s, we know these people still have dreams to get out of that, and aren’t likely to give them. They will be lost. That will put a real strain on the concept of whether “visceral thrill, derring-do and joyful abandon” type rugby will remain under the professional level here in NZ. I think at some point that can be eroded as well. If only wanting the best athlete’s at the top level wasn’t enough to lose that, shutting off the next group, or level, or rugby players from easy access to express and showcase themselves certainly will. That all comes back around to the same question of professionalism in rugby and whether it got things right, and rugby is better now. Maybe the answer is turning into a “no”?

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j
john 9 hours ago
Will the Crusaders' decline spark a slow death for New Zealand rugby?

But here in Australia we were told Penney was another gun kiwi coach, for the Tahs…….and yet again it turned out the kiwi coach was completely useless. Another con job on Australian rugby. As was Robbie Deans, as was Dave Rennie. Both coaches dumped from NZ and promoted to Australia as our saviour. And the Tahs lap them up knowing they are second rate and knowing that under pressure when their short comings are exposed in Australia as well, that they will fall in below the largest most powerful province and choose second rate Tah players to save their jobs. As they do and exactly as Joe Schmidt will do. Gauranteed. Schmidt was dumped by NZ too. That’s why he went overseas. That why kiwi coaches take jobs in Australia, to try and prove they are not as bad as NZ thought they were. Then when they get found out they try and ingratiate themselves to NZ again by dragging Australian teams down with ridiculous selections and game plans. NZ rugby’s biggest problem is that it can’t yet transition from MCaw Cheatism. They just don’t know how to try and win on your merits. It is still always a contest to see how much cheating you can get away with. Without a cheating genius like McCaw, they are struggling. This I think is why my wise old mate in NZ thinks Robertson will struggle. The Crusaders are the nursery of McCaw Cheatism. Sean Fitzpatrick was probably the father of it. Robertson doesn’t know anything else but other countries have worked it out.

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A
Adrian 11 hours ago
Will the Crusaders' decline spark a slow death for New Zealand rugby?

Thanks Nick The loss of players to OS, injury and retirement is certainly not helping the Crusaders. Ditto the coach. IMO Penny is there to hold the fort and cop the flak until new players and a new coach come through,…and that's understood and accepted by Penny and the Crusaders hierarchy. I think though that what is happening with the Crusaders is an indicator of what is happening with the other NZ SRP teams…..and the other SRP teams for that matter. Not enough money. The money has come via the SR competition and it’s not there anymore. It's in France, Japan and England. Unless or until something is done to make SR more SELLABLE to the NZ/Australia Rugby market AND the world rugby market the $s to keep both the very best players and the next rung down won't be there. They will play away from NZ more and more. I think though that NZ will continue to produce the players and the coaches of sufficient strength for NZ to have the capacity to stay at the top. Whether they do stay at the top as an international team will depend upon whether the money flowing to SRP is somehow restored, or NZ teams play in the Japan comp, or NZ opts to pick from anywhere. As a follower of many sports I’d have to say that the organisation and promotion of Super Rugby has been for the last 20 years closest to the worst I’ve ever seen. This hasn't necessarily been caused by NZ, but it’s happened. Perhaps it can be fixed, perhaps not. The Crusaders are I think a symptom of this, not the cause

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