The best suggestions in life are often the simplest. Many of the finest brains in the world have wrestled with how to improve rugby union as a sport and, as often as not, have ended up making it worse. Fair play, therefore, to Mr Martin McNeill of Richmond, Surrey who penned a short, pithy letter to the Sunday Times last weekend. The last sentence read thus: "I suggest any kick that is cleanly caught by the opposition leads to....a scrum from where the ball was kicked."
Genius. Well, almost. Mr McNeill missed out six words. If you insert "outside the 22" after "kick" and "the option of" in place of the dots you suddenly have a potential remedy for the curse of excessive kicking, currently causing players and spectators alike major neckache. Think about it. All those speculative hoists and aimless punts outlawed. Scrum-halves and fly-halves forced to abandon the lazy hit-and-hope option. Heaven forbid, some teams might even opt to run first-phase ball out of their own half. Welcome to the new rugby: much like the old, only with the boring ping-pong taken out.
So what are the flaws? Well, the little lofted chips over the top beloved of modern sides would need to become grubber kicks. Every team would have to be more judicious in the use of "Hail Mary" cross kicks. Anything else? Half-backs will complain that box-kicks suddenly lose currency. Tough. Remember we are only talking about kicks outside the 22. Anyone who resorts to a box-kick on the halfway line as a first option deserves to have possession taken away from him or her.
At this stage it is also worth examining a couple of other sports. Take ice hockey, for example. If a player fires the puck aimlessly towards the other end and no one has a chance to touch it, an official stops play and a face-off ensues in the defending zone of the team who committed the infraction. They call it "Icing". Rugby league has its "40-20 rule" to reward accurate long-distance punts which bounce into touch within 20 metres of the opposing line. The attacking side, not the defending team, is awarded the scrum in such cases.
And rugby union? Increasingly, anarchy rules. The balls fly further and the people hoofing them get stronger. Fear of being penalised at the breakdown makes the aerial route even more attractive. In response, some are suggesting a cap on the number of kicks in open play. Fine in theory, a counting-house nightmare in practice. Banning kicking altogether would be more disastrous still. Certain punts are things of beauty: think Phil Bennett's spiralling torpedoes or a steepling Munster garryowen. Kicks are as much a part of the 15-a-side furniture as scrums, lineouts or H-shaped posts.
There will always be sceptics at times like this who argue that inventing new laws in the comfort of your own home is rather easier than putting them into practice at first-class level. For insurance purposes, therefore, I canvassed the views of Bath's head coach, Steve Meehan, this week. "I'm a bit of a fan of trying things and throwing out those that don't work," responded Meehan thoughtfully. "There are traditions in the game that I like to keep guarded but there are laws that maybe we could tinker with. It would be an interesting one and would open up all sorts of things. There's a real skill to putting the ball in the right spot. It would change strategies and change our approach to training and skill development. Other sides might need to change their attitude."
Hmm. Interesting. Maybe it would favour more attack-minded sides and make life harder on wet days. Frankly, neither are insurmountable obstacles. Let's hope Mr McNeill posts us his solutions to global warming and the Afghanistan conflict next weekend. In the meantime, the International Board should give his idea some thought. It is a question of balance and, as things stand, the boot is kicking the game where it hurts.
Midfield minefield
Potential England centres are not enjoying the best of times. Riki Flutey, Toby Flood, Delon Armitage, Olly Barkley and, possibly, Jordan Turner-Hall are hors de combat, Mike Tindall has not shown much in the way of prime form and Jamie Noon and Tom May are in France. The No12 jersey is a crucial one and Martin Johnson, one suspects, is not about to hand it to Jonny Wilkinson. That leaves youngsters such as Shane Geraghty, Dominic Waldouck, Anthony Allen or Brad Barritt, good players all but short of international experience. Anyone else? Step forward a proven Test athlete, qualified for England after seven years residence. If Flutey can become an honorary Englishman, the odds on Bath's ex-Bradford and Kiwi RL centre Shontayne Hape doing the same are suddenly shortening.
Worm's eye view
Australia's heavy defeat to New Zealand in the final match of the Tri Nations season has stirred the pot down south. "Pampered poodles" and "powder puffs" were two of the kinder verdicts on the Wallaby effort but Chris Rattue in the New Zealand Herald – "You'd find more spine in a worm farm convention" – was by far the most hurtful. It won't leave him much wriggle room if the Aussies win the 2011 World Cup on Kiwi soil.
