Some rugby players wear very slim shoulder pads and vests. Is this allowed?

Question

Bryan Habana is a notable one who wears thin shoulder pads and the other day I noticed a Sharks player had a padded black vest on underneath his shirt. I thought the laws of rugby were quite clear that protective gear (apart from scrum caps) can not be worn?

Answer 1

Yes they are allowed a lot of top tier players wear them now they have to follow the same guidelines as the scrum caps regarding the padding.  I personally own a pair because of my shoulder problems and they have helped a lot.

Answer 2

Yep, you can. Generally, with most of it, the rule of thumb is it cannot be more than 0.5 cm when uncompressed, and it has to be soft so you don't hurt others.

Approved articles include:

-Shoulder pads (1cm uncompressed)

-Mitts [gloves] with fingers not going past the outer joint

-Shinguards (not the soccer kind, these has to be soft, and 0.5 cm uncompressed)

-Chest pads for women (1 cm uncomp.)

-Headgear you described (1 cm uncomp.)

There are some forearm guards out there; they don't cover those in the laws, but I think they fall in the 0.5 cm rule.

However, for the most part, you're right, you only see headgear and mouthguards.

Answer 3

They are allowed, but there is restrictions on them. They have to be relatively soft and quite small, so you do not injure a tackler that kind of thing.

Answer 4

in high school you can wear the thin pads there the same padding as a scrum cap has but there not rele popular where i play