The incredible disappearance of the drop goal....

....135 pool matches we had a total of 6 drop goals. Five of these came from S Africans, 2 by Cronje, 1 by Jantjies, 1 by Bosch and 1 by Coetzee. The only other drop was by Hunt of the Saders. .. Much of the decline can probably be ascribed to the new preference for the high cross kick under advantage...a chance to get 7 points, with a kick at goal as back up. Makes sense. .. But there are situations where the drop goal can still play a role. It has certainly won tight tests in the past, the most notable examples being the Jannie de Beer dropathon in the WC in 98 and the Stransky winner in the WC in 1995.

 Was thinking the same thing a couple of times recently. One successful drop could have won us the Ozz match back in RWC 2011....we had lots of ball and territory...and Morne...

Thank goodness!

Let's hope that during this new review of the rugby laws they devalue the drop goal to 2 points . . . or even better, a single point.

Back to the kicking game - is there nothing else to discuss?   The law changes in 2008 caused the tendency to play a different game with the emphasis on scoring tries.   So why keep on harping about the kicking issue.  
The cross kick is an attacking mechanism leading to tries being scored - even though the success rate is relatively minor.       

 Oh ffs. The drop is a part of the game just as much as the driving maul. The more they fiddle with the laws, the more they fook it up. Nothing wrong with a well executed drop in the dying moments of a match to win it. Play to your strengths....if you have a good player, use all his abilities to the maximum...and this is coming from a WP man who suffered Naas' boot for many a year.

 Draad
There is nothing wrong with dropped goals - but for the reason given it is not the preferred option by teams.

"Nothing wrong with a well executed drop in the dying moments of a match to win it."

Agree . . . that's why I have a problem with a drop goal being worth 3 points in that the glory-boy flyhalves like Gerald Bosch, Naas Botha and Jannie de Beer are tempted to accumulate points using drop goals.

I'm more than happy to retain the drop goal as a means of breaking a tie (as per Joel Stransky in 1995) but then it only needs to be worth one or two points, not three.

I think you misunderstood my post as a request to do away with drop goals rather than devalue them.

Originally the drop goal was the be-all and end-all. Not even a try was that important. The try only gave the team an opportunity for a "free try" at a drop goal, hence the term "try". The original idea, IIRC, was that a drop goal counted three points but the one coming after a try counted five. I'm not 100% sure of that but I have a copy of the original handwritten laws of the game on one of my laptops. Will see if I can find it and check up in it. Coincidentally the infamous forward pass law has not changed a great deal since that handwritten copy of the laws.

 
Well it does seem a little unfair to win a rugby match that way. I would prefer to see a hard fought contest, a collision of two teams, bruising physicality, power upfront with innovative running lines and team work, over that of long distant pot shots by a skilled drop goal artist who doesn't contribute much else.

Jannie De Beer is a fine example of what I wouldn't want wearing the 10 jersey. Give me a Lem any day.

No, according to the original Cambridge Rules drawn up in 1848, the "try" allowed a "free kick" which could be taken in "any manner the player may choose".

In 1871 when the laws were formalised, the "try" allowed the team a conversion attempt which was a place kick or a drop goal (same as it is today) and scored a single point.

There was no point in rugby's history (the 15 man game anyway) where the scoring of a try was followed by a conversion that had to be a drop kick.

No need to go searching for your handwritten laws, the history of Rugby Union scoring can be found on this page.

Spot on Draad it's part of the history of the game and a skill that should survive. Take it away and the game becomes less complex.

A fair point Moz, and I like the drop goal, but the game has become infinitely more complex as more and more rules are added. I don't think complexity is relevant as part of the argument.  

Exactly Bluebok. They have been adding BS in an effort to fix something that wasn't broken. We often hear that the game has evolved and that the game has become more complex and the game this, that and the other. The game has done f@kol. People have fcuked up the game with their constant stuffing around with BS. They have been trying to "fix" the scrums for years now and the more they try to fix it, the more the fcuk it up. They have almost done a 360 now. The only difference between now and "the old days" is that the ref tells them to engage and then tell the scrummie to put the ball in. In the old days the two packs decided when to engage and between the scrummie and his hooker they decided the moment the ball is put in. Go check any old footage. There is a nice clip of a game between SA and the NZ Cavaliers where you can clearly see this.

Totally agree...its now a worse game played by better athletes. Every time they extend the role of the video ref the game gets more pedantic.

 Interesting. Well I learned something today.

 Mozart
The object of the game nowadays is to scores tries - the idea to win games by kicking has gone.  If you are too old-fashioned to understand that - you completely miss the point.  
Fact is a converted try score 7 points and three drop kicks or penalty kicks are needed to better that.  
I have never even consider the removal of drop goals or penalty and try conversions from the game - even though it is becoming rare as you point out.  
In general winning teams use certain kicks as an attacking process and to relieve pressure - but unfortunately the execution by players are often poor without the desired affect.   Inaccurate and aimless kicking makes up a high percentage of kicks launched by SA players and that makes those a serious liability.
Live with it.
        

 When last did we see a push-over scrum try? These days good scrums milk penalties or penalty tries.

 Milking penalties has become common - sorry to see this.