From the outside, rugby may look like a brawl between fire-breathing man-beasts with mayhem on their minds. But those who play the game soon come to learn that it’s a lot more than a game. It’s a brotherhood that brings out the best in its players, and bonds them for life.
Rugby is an amazing sport that teaches you much more than just passing or kicking a rugby ball.
Like all team sports, rugby helps you appreciate that life is not always fair. Your personal success is often reliant on someone else doing what they are supposed to do. But given rugby’s intense physical nature, it’s a sport that goes beyond reliance, into the realm of co-dependency.
Hence the bond between team mates being a bond for life. One often hears about the “Rugby brotherhood”. It would be easy enough to laugh it off as something made up by a bunch of thick-eared Cro-Magnon types who have had too many beers in the pub after the game.
But it’s real.
Perhaps only truly understood by the guy who has had a team mate take a tackle from a Duane Vermeulen or Willem Alberts himself, instead of just sending the hospital pass out his way?
Or by someone who has had the ball sent their way for an easy run in for a try instead of the passer selling the dummy and notching up the try himself?
It’s these co-dependencies that make rugby the ultimate team sport.
The hooker and his locks: Throw the ball into the lineout perfectly and the locks get to look good doing their primary job. Get the timing of their jump wrong, though, and no matter how good a throw it was from the hooker, he is going to look like a nana.
Props and locks: Get the lift right in the lineout and not only does the prop get the lock into the air, but also deliver the space needed for the tall timber to thrive. In return, instead of loafing come scrum time, the locks actually use the little muscle they have in those long pins in order to allow the prop to get his way front.
Tight forward and loose forwards: Add a little oomph come scrum and lineout time form the flanks and 8th man, and in return the fat boys tend to get to the rucks and mauls in time to deliver clean ball for the loosies.
Scrumhalf and flyhalf: A quick, long pass goes a long way to making a flyhalf (and his backline) look good. But that pass can’t happen without knowing where the flyhalf is going to stand.
Inside and outside backs: Shovel the ball down the line without attracting the attention of a defender and the outside backs get man and ball behind the gain line. Use a little muscle or skill to suck in a defender or two, and it’s raining tries from the speedsters out wide.
Forwards and backs: Lose the battle up front, be it the scrum, lineout, breakdown or kick in, and it’s hack central from the peacocks out back as they start life on the back foot. Give them an easy ride through getting over the gain line up front, and boy do those guys like to fan out their tail feathers. It’s worth it just to stop them bleating, but every now and then they acknowledge the real heroes of the game by buying the sweaty sods a beer.
Get these co-dependencies to thrive, and you are a long way to a coach’s ultimate goal – getting the sum of the parts to be greater than the whole!
There is no space in rugby for the selfish chop looking for personal glory. It’s a sport that often requires one to sacrifice oneself for the greater good of the team. And that requires character, an understanding of the game beyond your own position, and an ability to make the people around you look good.
All while at war with foul-smelling, fire breathing man-beasts who would like nothing more than to see your head knocked clean off your shoulders!
Not only does rugby deliver lessons that remain with you for life, but friends that remain with you beyond the grave.
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