Concussion tackled

THIS weekend the new rules enacted on Wednesday designed to make rugby safer, faster and hopefully a better spectacle will be applied in top-level competition for the first time. 

Though there will inevitably be teething problems and probably a short-term glut of red cards, the rules are probably the biggest change in the game since it went professional in 1995.

The unavoidable changes are a response to the concussion suffered by ever faster, bigger and more powerful competitors — and a better awareness of the potential for devastating long-term consequences. The new rules outlaw tackles around the shoulder, neck and head which have the potential to cause the kind of damage that has no place in any sporting arena. Some old-school players, almost all retired and well out of the danger zone, have criticised the changes saying they will diminish the game and make it physically less competitive. It may make it less combative but hardly less physical. If the rules avert even one catastrophic injury they are very welcome and entirely justified.