I watched two games over the weekend. Dublin vs Tyrone in the All-Ireland Gaelic Football Quarter-Final and Waterford vs Tpperary in the All-Ireland Hurling Semi-Final. All four teams are strictly ‘amateur’ in that player receive no financial compensation for their efforts. They all have day jobs. The Football game was played in front of 82,000 people in lashing rain.
In both games the skill levels were remarkable. The vision, the awareness of space and in the case of every team except Dublin, the execution of these key skills were close to perfection despite the intensity of the occasion. Only one thing will get a player close to perfection under duress. Talent will not, physique will not, strength will not. Supplements will not.
Graft. Practice. Honing the key skills for hours on your own or with others will. It will give you confidence in your ability. It will give you a comforting familiarity with any situation you may face with the ball in hand.
On the whole rugby players do not hone their basic skill sets. We see players in the gym more and more, filling out, adding weight. We hear of coaches requesting players to simply ‘get bigger’. Rugby as a game of skill and tact is at risk of becoming simply a collision sport as players emphasis less and less on the skill aspects of their game.
Of course rugby players need a mix pace, strength and power. At the upper levels of the game these are essential to the game. I am not that naive. For a team to progress they need to be stronger, fitter, faster and smarter. However, when you see 19 year-old backs (who have come through the schools system) who can squat double their body weight but can barely string a kick, catch and pass together you know that something is not right. You really do.
5 Comments
August 18, 2008 at 10:26 pm
I think you know how much I disagree with this point of view. All of that is grand if there is nothing at stake when your coaching – thats simply not the case in any professional case or even any setup where any money is involved. I think there needs to be a distinction between a skills coach and a person who coaches a rugby team. The rugby team coach usually referred to as the head coach, is under pressure for results. That is what there job is – to achieve results. Like it or not – the teams that have won the last two world cups (England & South Africa) were two of the most direct teams in the competition. These teams relied heavily on there size and strength, and also the gameplan they were implementing. They knew how to win – in a professional sport. If nobody cares who wins then why do they keep score? Just because teams rely on aspects other than skill does not mean that they are unable to string a kick, catch and pass together. Infact most players that play top end age grade rugby are significantly more skillful than their counterparts 10 years ago.
August 19, 2008 at 12:39 am
Andy,
I’m not saying burn the gyms down but I am saying the emphasis players put on conditioning needs to complement the skill work otherwise the game will suffer in the long run.
August 19, 2008 at 1:12 pm
Well, England in 2003 also relied heavily on a fly-half who’d spent every evening of every day since his youth practising by drop-kicking and place kicking a ball at a single post until he could get it right every time, and who received the ball from a scrum half who’d spent a similar amount of time practising his passing from the base of the scrum and ruck so that at the crucial moment the pass would go to hand, so I think Mr Eskimo’s got a good point here.
As for a 19 year old back squatting twice his bodyweight, I’d like to know where his PE teachers qualified; every fitness instructor or PE teacher should know that it’s a bad idea for people to train with maximum weights before they’re fully grown AND ‘filled out’. The growth discs in their bones can be damaged which will lead to serious trouble further down the line. Many of those 19 year old backs will probably end up retiring with chronic injuries at about 25, long before they reach the peak of their ability. Get them out on a running track, or better still, sprinting up and down hills.
August 19, 2008 at 5:32 pm
I disagree somewhat wih the initial point made. Where skill is most certainly required, power, strenght and speed is needed in todays game even at age grade level.. .The players at age grade level and at prefessional level would not be there if they did not have the required skill to begin with. Combined with physicality, they exceel.
We are not living in the early 90’s now, the game has moved on, physicality of the game has moved on. One requires size to break tackles, one requires power and fast twitch muscle fibres to break through a gap, wheel a scrum, lift their lineout jumper faster, and most importantly, get over the gain line. All of this is required at a young age now.
If the player can string a pass together and has the neccesary skill, that is all well and good and as I aforementioned, it is a given if the player is at a high level. However, what use is it if the player is merely skillful if he is coming up against an opposition number week in week out who is twice as powerful, twice as muscular, and twice as fast. He would not progress to a high level, nor last very long at a high level. Simple as.
To Michael, yes England’s flyhalf practiced every waking hour on his kicking from a young age. However, he was also one of the biggest hitting fly halfs in world rugby, smashing the opposition repeatedly with hard hitting, powerful, offensive tackles. Which came from hard work in the weights room.
August 19, 2008 at 9:19 pm
Lads, I am not disregarding the gym work or strength work or conditioning. Far from it. It would be naive and unprofessional of me to do so. However I am raising the question about the nurturing of skills and whether players and coaches are beginning to overlook them?