Dear World Rugby, where is the consistency? You made it pretty clear the last couple of years that contact to the head should be dealt with red cards. You also made it pretty clear that context or intent does not matter when dealing with contact to the head. So I ask again, why does it change every week? You have got to make a choice, either we give every incident with contact to the head red cards. Or we do the smart thing and actually allow refs to use common sense when dealing with situations like this. Yet, these last couple of years there was no common sense when dealing with contact to the head. In this video I showcase an incident where there is direct contact made to Siya Kolisi's head, with no mitigating factors. This incident was not even deemed a penalty. Then I also show a clip where a Wales player is diving off his feet, directly into the head of Eben Etzebeth, making contact with high force. This also, was not even a penalty. I compare the clips of the Wales player diving off his feet to two clips from last year that occurred in the Wales vs Australia game and also Scotland vs Australia game. In both those games there were incidents where a player tried to clean at a ruck, made contact to the head and in both those cases there were yellow cards involved. You could argue that the one from last weekend was way worse than the two from last year, yet nothing was done. So where is the consistency?
I can go over any game and find incidents like this where a rugby collision happens, that happens to also be contact to the head. It's rugby, hits like this happens. Stop ruining the game by giving out red cards for accidental rugby collisions. If opened up Pandora's box when you started treating accidental head clashes like foul play. Now you're paying the price for your dumb decision to do that. So make the decision, either completely ban rugby collisions or just accept that rugby is a violent sport that has many injury risks. Nobody wants a player to get dementia, you have to be completely dumb to wish that upon any player. But how hard is it to accept that rugby is a violent sport? We can have a discussion about dementia and CTE, I'm all for that. I'm also all for it to do it like the NFL did. They had to pay for hiding the data surrounding player safety during the old school era where players did not know about the concussions and CTE risks. However, they paid for it and now every single player entering the NFL knows the risk attached to it. They also know the reward for doing it. If they don't think the risk is worth the reward, then the decision is simple... Don't play rugby. Nobody is forcing them to play, and I can promise you that no fan will hold it against a player if they decide to retire early because of not wanting to take the risk of getting head injuries. I look at Pat Lambie who had to retire early, No fan every gave him any heat for it. We actually supported him even more for looking after himself.
But this ridiculous policy surrounding contact to the head should be stopped. It's ruining the game. It's not about "The game going soft", it's about common sense. Stop being naïve to think rugby is a safe sport. It will never be a safe sport. There will always be injury risks associated with rugby. The same thing with the NFL, not a lot of players decided to retire after the whole concussion/CTE lawsuit because most of the player were fine with the risk and deemed the reward worth it. And again, there were quite a few players who decided to retire early after getting to see the data, and nobody held it against them. The same thing will happen in rugby. What the fans don't get is that World Rugby are a bunch of cowards who are trying to act like angels with their strict policy. Ask yourselves why that is? Don't you think it's because they know they are going to have to pay a lot of money to the players suing them from the old era. And I'm totally okay with that. Those players did not have the data we do know to make an educated decision. And it's really sad that some of them are dealing with dementia and possible CTE, because nobody should have to deal with that. However, don't forget the other side of the spectrum of players who's lives were completely changed thanks to rugby. Players who came from nothing and made enough money support generations of their family. Stop acting like rugby was only bad for players from the old generation because it also changed a lot of lives. There's 2 sides to the coin.
As for this current generation of players, they know the risks. It's simply, do you think the money is worth for the potential of head trauma. If yes, then play rugby and make the best of it. If your answer is no, then retire or don't play rugby. Nobody will hold it against you and the rugby community will wish you the best of luck in your future endeavors.
