RUGBY SCORING.

Press, Volume LXIV, Issue 19357, 9 July 1928, Page 11

RUGBY SCORING.

TO THS BDITOB OJ THE PRESS. Sir,—l beg most humbly, but emphatically to disagree with a great deal of your two leaders on Rugby scoring. You speak, I think in both articles, of goalkicking being entirely foreign to the spirit of Rugby." I don't quite understand what you mean, but would like to tell;,you that at the birthplace of the game, some fifteen to twenty strenuously contested games were played three days a week during the winter months, with no referees anywhere around. That is nothing very extraordinary in itself, but some might be surprised to learn that during more than four happy years spent at this famous seat of learning, I never saw any argument, dirty play, or bad blood in any of games; the captain, or one or two of* the bigger boys on each side, if the captain didn't see, tacitly giving a scrum, etc., for whatever had taken place. In these daya when players are sent off the ground in the biggest of matches for foul plav, I think the above speaks volumes for the "spirit of Rugby." Conversion of tries, you say, "makes a team watch the centre of the line more closely than the sides, "but you do not go on to say that if, in spite of this alertness the attackers succeed in gaining a try under the posts it is more creditable than getting one in the corner. Drop goals are doubtless not worth as much as a converted try, but what are the defenders doing to let a man get the chance to drop a goal? Where is the marking and surely a dropped goal in a fast game is one of the prettiest things to see? You use the expression, "Simply because a player has succeeded in catching the ball and calling mark." Again you appear to have lost sight of one of the niceties of the game. What was the player doing who "hacked" the ball into the blue in a panic-stricken manner to let the other fellow make his mark? No Sir, you have the.cart before the-horse. It is not so much a reward for making a mark as a deterrent to the foolish one who made it possible for him to do so. With regard to penalty kicks in front of goal. The rules are straightforward and obvious, and there is no necessity to break them. Constant breaking of the rules holds up and spoils the game, and any player who through carelessness or "infringes the rules" (your word), or "fouls" (my word) anywhere wilfully near his own goal knows that he is liable to lose his side four points. If you break the rules and get punished, why growl? You speak of the "earnestness" with which the game is played to-day being a good reason for altering the scoring. I suggest you cut out some of the modern earnestness—(it's only a game after all), stick to the old rules, and the old kind of earnestness.—Yours, etc., O.K. July 7th, 1928.