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Last night I watched with dismay as two more players in the New Zealand v Namibia match (Ofisa Tu'ungafasi and Nepo Laulala) failed to learn the lessons from previous incidents. They both came in with swinging arms, both made contact with their opponent's head. In both cases, the mitigation was that the ball carriers were on the way down, and as a result those players only got YC. Either or both could easily have copped a RC. What annoyed me was that in both cases, what they did was completely unnecessary - if they had just little more awareness, they would have realised the players were already going to ground. There was no reason to attempt a tackle, let alone use a swinging arm. The smart play would have been to let the players go to ground and try to latch onto the ball to get a turnover - if the player falls over on his own, there is no gate and no such thing as side entry, you can jackle from any direction
The aim of WR here is clearly to get players to tackle and cleanout lower. My only concern is how long is it going to take them to learn? The original "spear tackle memorandum" was in June 2006 - five years later in 2011, Sam Warburton got his marching orders. Now fast forward to the 2019 RWC, and two Italians do it all again?
If players haven't learned to stop lifting opponents off the ground, will they ever, and how long will they take to change their tackle/cleanout technique to do so lower?
The aim of WR here is clearly to get players to tackle and cleanout lower. My only concern is how long is it going to take them to learn? The original "spear tackle memorandum" was in June 2006 - five years later in 2011, Sam Warburton got his marching orders. Now fast forward to the 2019 RWC, and two Italians do it all again?
If players haven't learned to stop lifting opponents off the ground, will they ever, and how long will they take to change their tackle/cleanout technique to do so lower?
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