Sir, - History does not record whether William Webb Ellis was punished for his "fine disregard" in being the founder of rugby football but he would surely have intended it to be a school game with emphasis on each word. At school level it used to be (and still can be) a magnificent game in which there was place for a wide range of skill - even the lack of it ("he'll be grand in the second row"). The expectation was a desire to play one's hardest, to be modest in victory and generous in defeat. Supporters added to the enthusiasm and applauded both sides - but noisy parents and invasive coaches were unknown.
My own innocence was dented at university where training for the important match was of the "get blood on your boot" and "hit him so hard that he doesn't get up" variety - perhaps only figures of speech. Subsequent club rugby was somewhat more relaxed but in those days one played to keep fit and not the other way round.
The adult game is now different. For a start it is seldom a game, rather a deadly-serious sport controlled, like most things, by money. It is not fortuitous that in many respectable newspapers sport and financial news go together. And like the Circus Maximus, professional football is a political issue, an anodyne for a large section of society. Rugby has unfortunately followed suit.
Rules have been changed, not with the player in mind but to attract spectators, sponsors and even the appalling corporate host. Not being allowed to kick straight into touch has excluded the light, dodgy three-quarter: picking up after a tackle introduced dangers which also favour size. Other changes and improvements have had their side-effects. The momentum (weight x speed) required of every modern player is spectacular but limiting, and makes for danger. These changes may have been right for a professional spectator-sport, but the school game is inflicted with the same rules and becomes infected by the same ethos. Despite annual cases of life-ruining injury (and schoolboys are the most vulnerable), a serious attempt a few years back by a number of schools to have special rules for the schoolboy game (especially to do with scrummaging, tackling above the waist and age/weight matching) was only partly successful.
Is it not desirable that schools, colleges and amateur clubs should have their own Amateur RFU (with representation from the IRFU) free to make its own experiments with rules and procedures for the amateur game up to international standard, and especially for the school game? The professional sport can continue on its sensational way, but in fairness to William Webb Ellis's school it should not be called rugby. Thugby, perhaps. - Yours, etc., D. S. Gibbs,
Cullahill, Co. Laois.