World Rugby Announces Series Of Exciting New Laws To Be Trialled

Exciting law trials will take place in national competitions during 2015-16 season with the successful ones taken forward to global trial from 2017.

Six-point tries and two-point penalties and dropped goals are being trialed in Wales and Australia under World Rugby’s auspices as part of proposed law changes to make the game safer and more enjoyable.

The value of tries rose from four points to five in 1992, while penalties and dropped goals have been worth the same three points since 1948. By increasing the value of tries to the same as American football’s touchdown, World Rugby want to further reward tries over goalkicks.

The “crouch-bind-set” scrum engagement has also been amended. Now, the front rows must come together at the referee’s first command to crouch, instead of third command to set. That’s designed, especially at elite level, to reduce the number of collapses and resets.

Mauls must also start moving within five seconds, otherwise it’s over, and even if a team exhausts its front-row options and must play uncontested scrums, it must still put eight men in a scrum.

Proposed laws were previously tested in closed trials, but World Rugby sought more meaningful testing and feedback, and reached agreement to try the changes in the ongoing Principality Cup in Wales, and the National Rugby Championship in Australia.

They will expand next year into the likes of the Pacific Challenge, Tbilisi Cup, European Nations Cup, and Under-20 World Trophy. Feedback will be sought in mid-2016, and a decision made late next year whether to begin global trials. Any new laws wouldn’t be passed until 2018.