Anybody watching the Supersport rugby show?
Some interesting chat about mauling loopholes.
They showed a bit of the Tahs/Saders game. At a lineout maul the Tahs appeared to be swimming but weren't blown for it despite it looking to be blatantly illegal.
Matfield said something interesting.
He reckoned that over the last few years in England they've been using a technicality in the way the laws are written so as to come up with a new way to defend at maul time.
Apparently as long as the player joins through the gate and does not swim then he is allowed to maul from the side...spinning the maul around. IE as long as you are not arriving there illegally then all's good. Depending how the maul defense is set up and/or how well the lineout is read, it's possible to put those defenders in very good positions to basically maul sideways, early on...without being penalised.
Quite obvious but nobody has been doing it in SR until now.
Also risky since if it doesn't work then you're left thin at the front and hand the oppo some momentum free of charge.
Defending it, on the surface of it anyway, is simple since all that's required is widening the pack. On one side if the defense is being read well and both if it's not.
If this becomes a regularly used tactic then more nice 50/50 mind games are gonna make their way into that part of the game. Defending mauls will be more about making the right call or read rather than relying mainl y on brute force.
A smaller pack might then be able to dominate a much larger one.
Matfield reckons Mr Jones's England are gonna use this next month against us.
Luckily Rassie is fresh from that way and probably knows all about it already.
