Rugby Australia will wait to study the outcome of competitions with different tackle height restrictions in France, New Zealand and France before deciding whether to implement a similar change in future years, chief executive Andy Marinos said.
Legal tackle height has been a hot topic in rugby this week after the Rugby Football Union announced all rugby below the elite levels in England would be played with a ban on tackles above the waist from July.
The move, designed to reduce head-contact injuries, was brought in without consultation and has caused uproar among clubs, and divided opinions among leading coaches and players.
After a media report in England on Friday suggesting World Rugby want to roll out a global trial of lowered tackle height, Marinos said Australia would not be rushed into such a move and stressed a bigger focus on coaching players around correct tackle technique – as practised in Australia – is as important as a restriction on tackle height.
In reality, World Rugby only control the professional levels of the game and do not have the power to enforce changes to the amateur game in member unions.
“It is a national union-driven thing and one that is going to require extensive consultation with all our levels if we were to consider that,” Marinos told the Herald.
Would this be an illegal tackle in the future?Credit:Getty
“The important thing coming out of all of this is around player safety and player welfare and wellbeing. There is enough evidence to say, ‘yes, head on head is catastrophic, and we have to reduce that’.
“But now we have these different bands, so to speak, about how we look at tackle height, in France and New Zealand and England. Let’s run those trials and let’s get the information.
“In an Australian context, in 2017 we adopted the blue card into the community game, which allows the referees and the match officials to identify when there player safety has been compromised. So we have quite a stringent process that we manage that through.
“So for Rugby Australia now, it is about getting that information and if we were to think about making any changes, there would have to be a very, very wide and extensive consultation as a game in Australia. We will do what’s right for Australian rugby.”
World Rugby is likely to settle on a position between the waist and the sternum under suggested new tackle laws.Credit:Getty
Marinos declined to give any timeframe on how long Rugby Australia would study the data but said that while player welfare was the main consideration, other elements would also be factored in.
“Let’s understand what that is telling us: are we seeing a reduction in concussions? Is it having a material impact on the flow of the game? Is the education around the tackle technique there? Are the match officials able to decipher now whether it is a legal or an illegal tackle? Those are answers that you have to factor in,” he said.
“We are seeing more and more in the professional game is when you are close to the line, you pick and go. Typically you have a very low body position, so it almost becomes impossible to tackle. Does that have to change? There are a lot of subtle nuances we have to understand before I would be comfortable, as Rugby Australia, putting this out for a wider conversation within our rugby community.”
World Rugby chief executive Alan Gilpin backed the RFU’s move in an interview with the London Telegraph but acknowledged his organisation’s limits.
“When you look at the community game, it’s challenging to roll that out on a global basis,” Gilpin said. “It requires significant buy-in from the game in different parts of the world.”
According to sources familiar with the situation, there has not, in recent years, been any discussion at Rugby Australia about trialling lower tackle heights in the amateur game.
Responding to several deaths in amateur rugby, French rugby began trials in 2019 lowering the tackle height to the waist, and banning two-person tackles. New Zealand last year began club rugby trials with a legal tackle height of the nipple-line, or sternum, and allowed two-man tackles.
French data shows head injuries have reduced by a factor of four, and been a success in ensuring heads of defenders and attackers are not in the same airspace. But critics of the waist-line tackle height say defenders will be in the firing line of knees and hips, and Marinos said he understands those concerns.
Rugby Australia chief executive Andy Marinos.Credit:Getty
“We all know hitting in the midriff, in the gut area, is probably the most effective way to effect a tackle and the safest way to probably effect a tackle,” Marinos said. “That communication of what is the waistline, or what is the tackle line, is going to be critically important.
“There is a higher risk of concussion tackling around the hip and the legs than what there would be if you were going around the midriff. And that’s how we prepare our teams now because we know upright tackles and head-to-head contact can cost you so significantly.”
Marinos said he’d like safe tackle technique to become a big a priority around the world.
Recently, Rugby Australia elevated tackle technique to alongside scrummaging as the two major focal points in national coach education and accreditation programs.
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