“Harder to defend” – Stuart Lancaster warns Irish teams must adapt to new law guideline
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Maul.
World Rugby’s new guidance on how mauls are refereed is now in play for the new URC season, and Stuart Lancaster believes it will make life harder for teams defending against powerful packs.
The guidance deals with defenders who initially get into a strong position in a maul but end up beyond the ball as it moves. Once they are no longer contesting possession, they cannot stay there to pull at opponents or disrupt the ball being played away. Referees have been told to manage or penalise them.
It’s a clarification of how the existing law is enforced, rather than a new law. For defending teams, it means that getting through a maul does not necessarily give a player the right to remain there and interfere with the drive.
Connacht faced that challenge in Friday night’s 29-15 defeat to the Stormers. Captain Paul Boyle was shown a yellow card for entering a maul from the side, and the visitors scored from another drive while he was off the field.
“It’s still a problem we need to solve,” Lancaster said.
“When I go back to think about last season and the two games against Montpellier and the power teams, the new rules are making it harder to defend.
“Teams are going to maul more outfield as the Stormers did and then obviously that maul outfield leads to a penalty.”
Lancaster said competing for the lineout ball before a maul forms is one option, and Connacht did steal possession on occasions. But the Stormers’ scrum created another problem whenever the home side made a mistake.
“What you want to do is avoid giving them lots of scrums, and we gave them too many really.”
Boyle said the stricter approach to entry angles makes defending particularly difficult against a South African pack. Challenging in the air can help, but if the opposition still wins the lineout, the defence has to deal with an organised drive.
Lancaster believes Connacht must also improve their accuracy with the ball to avoid handing power-based teams the set pieces they want.
“We can’t change the laws ourselves; we’ve got to deal with the laws,” he added.
“We need to be better at playing against the power-based teams.”
