Rugby football

A BCRFC match at Boston College

Rugby football, often just "rugby", may refer to a number of sports descended from a common form of football developed at Rugby School in England United Kingdom. Rugby union and rugby league, (and, to a lesser extent, American football, Canadian football and Australian Rules Football) are modern sports that originated from rugby football, and are the only two sports likely to be referred to as "rugby" today.

Rules

Main Article: Comparison of rugby league and rugby union

Distinctive features common to both rugby codes (league and union) include the prolate spheroid ball and the ban on passing the ball forward, so that players can gain ground only by running with the ball or by kicking it.

Scoring in both games occurs by achieving either a try or a goal. A try (at goal) involves grounding the ball (touching the ball to the ground) over the goal line at the opponent's end of the field. A goal results from kicking the ball over the crossbar between the upright goal posts. Three different types of kick at goal can score points: the goal kick after a try has been awarded (which if successful becomes a conversion); the drop kick; and the penalty kick. The points awarded for each vary between the games.

The main differences between the two games, besides league having teams of 13 players and union of 15, involve the tackle and its aftermath:

• Union players contest possession following the tackle: depending on the situation, either a ruck or a maul occurs. League players may not contest possession after making a tackle: play is continued with a play-the-ball (AKA: "Scratch")

• In league, if the team in possession fails to score before a "set of six" tackles, it surrenders possession. Union has no six-tackle rule; a team can keep the ball for an unlimited number of tackles before scoring as long as it maintains possession.

Set pieces of the union code include the scrum, where packs of opposing players push against each other for possession, and the lineout, where parallel lines of players from each team, arranged perpendicular to the touch-line (the side line) attempt to catch the ball thrown from touch (the area behind the touch-line).

In the league code, the scrum still exists, but with greatly reduced importance. Set pieces are generally started from the play-the-ball situation which has meant that rugby league has evolved into what some perceive as a faster and more attacking game with a greater emphasis on running with the ball in hand, passing and scoring tries. Many of the rugby league positions have similar names and requirements to rugby union positions but there are no flankers in rugby league. The result of these variations have led to rugby union being considered the more traditional form of rugby.

The status of the rugby codes in various countries

Rugby league is played both as a professional and amateur sport both domestically and internationally in Australia, France, Great Britain and New Zealand. It is regarded as the national sport of Papua New Guinea. There are semi-professional and amateur competitions of rugby league which take place in Russia, Wales, Scotland, Serbia, Lebanon, South Africa, Japan, Canada, the United States, Fiji, Cook Islands and Tonga. (For further information see: list of international rugby league teams.)

Rugby union, also a professional and amateur game, is dominated by ten tier one unions: Argentina, Australia, England, France, Ireland, Italy, New Zealand, Scotland, South Africa and Wales. Rugby union is a major sport played nationwide in each of these countries. Rugby union is the national sport in New Zealand, and Fiji and the main sport in South Wales and amongst the white population in South Africa. Italy, which has also become increasingly competitive in recent decades, is also classed as Tier One by the IRB. Numerous "minor" unions include Canada, Chile, Fiji, Georgia, Japan, Namibia, Portugal, Romania, Samoa, Spain, Tonga and Uruguay. In Malaysia, rugby union is played by campus students. (For further details see list of international rugby union teams.) Rugby union ranks as the national sport of Pacific countries such as Tonga, Fiji, and Samoa. Fiji places special emphasis on rugby sevens, a variant of union with only seven players a side instead of the standard 15; its national team is one of the world's most honoured in that variant. Samoa is also a consistently high finisher in international sevens events.

Culture

In the U.K, an old saying goes "football is a gentlemen's game played by hooligans , and rugby [union] is a hooligan's game played by gentlemen". In most rugby-playing countries, rugby union is widely regarded as an "establishment", historically amateur sport, played mostly by members of the middle and upper classes. For example, many students at private schools and grammar schools play rugby union. By contrast, rugby league has traditionally been seen as a working class, professional, pursuit. A contrast to this ideology is evident in the neighbouring unions of England and Wales. In England the sport is very much associated with the public schools system (i.e. independent/private schools). In Wales, rugby is associated with small village teams which consisted of coal miners and other industrial workers playing on their days off.

Exceptions to the above include New Zealand, Wales, Cornwall, the Borders region of Scotland, County Limerick in Ireland, Roussillon in southern France, and the Pacific Islands, where rugby union is popular in working class communities. Nevertheless, rugby league retains great popularity among working class people in the English counties of Yorkshire, Lancashire and Cumbria, and in the Australian states of New South Wales and Queensland. In the United Kingdom, rugby union fans sometimes use the term "rugger" as an alternative name for the sport, (see Oxford '-er'). Also the kick off is known to be called "Rug Off" in some regions. Those considered to be heavily involved with the rugby union lifestyle — including heavy drinking and striped jumpers — sometimes identify as "rugger buggers". Retired rugby union players who still turn up to watch, drink and serve on committees rank as "alickadoos" or, less kindly, as "old farts".

Because of the nature of the games (almost unlimited body contact with little or no padding), the rugby world frowns on unsporting behaviour, since even a slight infringement of the rules may lead to serious injury or even death. Because of this, governing bodies enforce the rules strictly.

Rugby league supporters sometimes call themselves "treizistes", reflecting the French title of their sport (rugby à treize). The epithet occurs almost universally in France, but its use has also spread to English-speaking countries.

Australia is unusual in that rugby league is the more popular of the two codes. Support for both codes is concentrated in New South Wales and Queensland. The same perceived class barrier as exists between the two games in England also occurs in these two states, fostered by rugby union's prominence and support at elite private schools. Australian followers of rugby league usually refer to rugby league as "footy" or "football" and rugby union as "rugby" or "union". A popular television show dealing with rugby league, called The Footy Show screens weekly during the NRL season. Followers of rugby union usually refer to rugby union as "rugby" and to rugby league simply as "league". In Victoria, South Australia, Western Australia and Tasmania, "football" usually means Australian rules football, and there is no popular differentiation between the two kinds of "rugby". In areas where all three codes are popular, such as the Australian Capital Territory, the Northern Territory, and the Riverina, people generally use the names "league", "union" and "Aussie rules" or "AFL" to avoid confusion.

New Zealanders generally refer to rugby union simply as either "football", "rugby" or "rugby union" and to rugby league as "rugby league", "football" or "league". In New Zealand, playing rugby football has a reputation as the epitome of manliness for both Māori and Pākehā (non-Māori), as symbolised by a haka (war dance) at the start of important games. Kiwis see rugby as the accepted substitute for military heroism and an excellent training ground for soldiering. If (as the Duke of Wellington allegedly said) Britain won the Battle of Waterloo on the playing-fields of Eton, New Zealand long saw its role in the British Empire as intimately connected with the football field. Popular Kiwi mythology sees the encouragement of New Zealand rugby in the late 19th and early 20th centuries as the Imperial reaction to declining fitness in Britain's industrial slums.

See also

• Comparison of rugby league and rugby union
• Rugby league
• History of rugby league
• Rugby union
• History of rugby union
• Football
• Medieval football

External links

• Rules Of the Rugby (Union) game
• Richard Lindon inventor of the Rugby Ball
• Lomas Athletic Club.
• Rugby World - Polish Rugby Forum