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Are red cards solving the high tackle problem?

By Ben Smith
(Photo by Peter Meecham/Getty Images and GEOFF CADDICK/AFP via Getty Images)

Are red cards for high tackles making the game any safer? It is a genuine question the game must answer in due time, if it wants to really improve player safety.

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The reactive measure to disincentivise contact to the head through punishment is supposed to change player behaviour over time so that there are fewer and fewer high tackles made.

We can all agree that this is the desired end goal given the rapidly growing understanding of CTE and head knocks. The stories of those now suffering after years of playing are harrowing and we all want to see less of them, ideally none in a perfect world.

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But, what if over the next five years say, we don’t see a reduction in high tackles? That this supposed solution that we have, red cards for high shots, does nothing to quell to the number of high contacts and the game continually sees players sent off for such indiscretions.

What then? Will the righteous crusade end in defeat or will it continue in this vein until there are simply no red cards left?

After a couple of years of tackle height frameworks and new rules, it is unclear whether these measures having the desired effect of stamping out head-high tackles. If there is data to show it, World Rugby or other governing bodies should release it.

The rugby public should be able to see the progress we are making, if there is any. That kind of transparency is critical at this point in time with the game in the state that it is in.

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Otherwise, there must be other options on the table to improve player welfare and maintain the contest on the field instead or in addition to issuing red cards, which were previously reserved for intentional, malicious acts of foul play such as punching, eye gouging, stamping and the spear tackle.

The inherent problem with the tackle area is that it is a high-speed collision event that, at times, becomes uncontrollable. A slight angle change by this player or the entry of another tackler into the collision zone adds complexity that results in player error.

No one has the telepathic capability to predict what someone else will do at light speed, let alone then react to change course and prevent the worst from happening.

In some cases, the offender might be reckless, careless or negligent, but regardless, it is still a miscalculation and in most cases an unintentional error of execution.

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The game has decided to punish this player error by virtue of red cards as a means to solve the problem. This isn’t disputing the concussion issue, only to ask if this solution that is in place is actually working.

Surely the end goal is to actually reduce concussions, not just virtue signal that we stand against them by continuing to issue red cards in a public condemnation of the act after the fact.

The former is what we are after, the latter is not. The latter is not progress, it is simply moral grandstanding around the issue while letting it continue. Any solution, whatever it is, must be measured and be proven to be having a quantifiable impact.

We can issue 1,000 red cards to make it feel like we are doing something, but it does not reverse the impact of contact to the head in those thousand instances.

It is only supposed to disincentivise the next one, and that disincentive does not seem to be working as intended.

This is the prohibition argument all over again, whether it is illicit substances or high tackles. Does the threat of punishment of an act actually stop it from happening again and again?

There are other factors at play that mean you can’t help but feel this is a window dressing exercise that does not go to the extent it needs to if player welfare is genuinely at the heart of the cause.

How often does the game see a player carded for a high tackle, yet fail to see the tackled player taken off for a mandatory head injury assessment.

Surely if player welfare is paramount, any player that is tackled high enough to warrant punishment should receive a mandatory HIA.

This is the kind of hypocrisy that casts doubt over the intention for the current crackdown on high tackles.

We happily card the offender and don’t bother to assess the victim unless they are completely legless, like Ireland lock James Ryan was at Twickenham earlier in the year.

He was forced from the field because he couldn’t stand on two feet. Others have simply got up and played on.

We know that the head is sacrosanct and must be protected as much as possible if the game is to reduce the number of concussions suffered by playing.

Why is it then legal for a ball carrier to duck into tackles, leading with the crown of the head into opposing players? We see this habit occur frequently by ball carriers ducking into contact, head-first.

We’ve gone to lengths to protect the ball carrier from defenders, but if the ball carrier does this, it is okay?

Perhaps the top of the head is a ‘better’ place to be hit than the face and chin area, and this why players do it as a means of bracing for a high impact contact, but it doesn’t make it any easier for the tackler.

Aside from complicating the safe tackle zone for the defence, what happens if the ball carrier leads with the head and makes high contact with the defender?

If the game is serious about protecting the head in the tackle zone, the next step is to force the ball carrier to take some responsibility and place some onus on them to respect the head, even if it is their own.

Eventually, every area of the game needs to be understood for the role in concussion. It can’t just be high tackles. It must be all on field collision events – scrums, breakdowns, tackles of all kinds, aerial collisions.

Southern Hemisphere administrators have pushed for a 20-minute red card in order to reduce the impact on the contest, allowing a side to return to 15 players by substituting the offending player after the 20-minute period.

Herein lies the problem with taking a punishment reserved for extreme foul play and mixing it with one for an act of accidental error.

Highlanders first five Sam Gilbert was red carded for a spear tackle on Waratahs flanker Michael Hooper in the latest round of Super Rugby Pacific. He made a mistake, as players do, but it was incredibly dangerous.

It was the kind of tip tackle that would’ve immediately warranted a red card punishment in any era, where the Highlanders would have been down to 14 men for the entire contest.

The 20-minute red card was the only available option, so the Highlanders returned to a full complement after 20 minutes. By meddling with the original intention of the red card, unintended consequences will follow.

This is perhaps the unsolvable issue for rugby. To keep things in context to the wider sporting world, it is great that there is a desire to make change.

The UFC and professional boxing don’t seem to have a plan, but business goes on. On the surface, there is no solution for combat sport but to stop altogether. For collision sports, reduction has to be key.

At some point, the realisation might be made that there will never be an eradication of all concussion events in rugby, but reductions can be achieved. Welfare can be improved, as it has over time.

But, is the game truly committed to finding every possible way to understand and limit them, or is it just grandstanding around it with half-baked solutions based on postering without measuring if its current measures are working? If we are seeing results, share them.

Because if we aren’t actually making progress, the game won’t be any safer and these issues won’t be solved or reduced.

It will just be a never ending card crackdown to show how much we all stand against concussion.

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Jon 1 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 3 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.

15 Go to comments
A
Adrian 5 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

15 Go to comments
T
Trevor 8 hours ago
Will forgotten Wallabies fit the Joe Schmidt model?

Thanks Brett.. At last a positive article on the potential of Wallaby candidates, great to read. Schmidt’s record as an international rugby coach speaks for itself, I’m somewhat confident he will turn the Wallaby’s fortunes around …. on the field. It will be up to others to steady the ship off the paddock. But is there a flaw in my optimism? We have known all along that Australia has the players to be very competitive with their international rivals. We know that because everyone keeps telling us. So why the poor results? A question that requires a definitive answer before the turn around can occur. Joe Schmidt signed on for 2 years, time to encompass the Lions tour of 2025. By all accounts he puts family first and that’s fair enough, but I would wager that his 2 year contract will be extended if the next 18 months or so shows the statement “Australia has the players” proves to be correct. The new coach does not have a lot of time to meld together an outfit that will be competitive in the Rugby Championship - it will be interesting to see what happens. It will be interesting to see what happens with Giteau law, the new Wallaby coach has already verbalised that he would to prefer to select from those who play their rugby in Australia. His first test in charge is in July just over 3 months away .. not a long time. I for one wish him well .. heaven knows Australia needs some positive vibes.

21 Go to comments
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