Crouch - touch - .... - ENGAGE!!? Your thoughts?

Question

http://www.nzherald.co.nz/section/4/story.cfm?c_id=4&objectid=10524332

In the Air New Zealand Cup, the IRB thas given the NZRFU the green light to go ahead and give yet another amendment to the pre-engagement scrummaging sequence.

I think this trial may have something to it because when the crouch-touch-pause-engage routine was first used last year, we saw when the referee raced through the sequence quickly we saw less scrum collapses. Sadly this year, all the referees have gone through the sequence much slower, causing more scrum collapses.

Will omitting the 'pause' part of the scrum routine reduce the proportion of scrums that are collapsing? Your comments please.

Answer 1

hmmm i wasnt sure where you were going with this question..

Answer 2

It's ridiculous. They keep changing the rules, if they can't settle on one set of rules, go back to the amateur days when there was no call and the scrums would just fly into each other.

Answer 3

the crouch-touch-pause-engage, when i first heard it called in rugby, i thought that the g*y lobby had taken over

Answer 4

I think you might be right.  The number of collapsed scrums basically because the referee can't the timing of the call right is unacceptable.  Most referees if not all have never been a front rower in a scrum and they are handed the task of managing the scrums.  Most of them don't have a clue what's going on.

Anything constructive that removes something of the refs tasks in scrum management is a step forward for mine.

Answer 5

Setting up to go into the scrum at a sloower pace seems to create uncoordination within the scrum engage especially among the tight five. The engage, with about 5 huge tight five forwards and 3 loose forwards  seem to put in a heavty lunge than a which results in major overbalance and instability. It also comes down to the temperament of each scrum. Especially in the first 20 minutes each scrum is busting at the seams to engage against each other to get the other hand. So less time is probably needed. If too much time is taken, both scrums spend too much time listening to the referees command causing mistiming and collapse. remember the old days when the tight head for team with put in made the call to engage. It seemed to work better then. Both scrums are probably better left to their won devices to concebtrate on setting combative, stable scrums.