Gareth Thomas profile in SI

Not Smith's best effort.

I was generally enthused to read the story. I think I got to about paragraph 15 and realized I didn't give a shit. He didn't hook me.

 

I have played some club rugby and the drinking is almost a cliche. It seemed like many felt compelled to drink to live up to the "image".

Rugby aficionados like to portray the game to be as physical and tough as football. It just is not. Properly player it is more of a finesse game and a good one at that.

As as article it was just to covertly preachy as only Smith can do.

 

Uh, no. Not at all really.

The teams that have had the most success, especially in the Super 14 and Heineken Cup in recent years such as Toulouse, who advanced to the Heineken final on Saturday, have done it through a dominant forward pack that grinds its opponents into submission and wears them out through the strength of its scrum, rucking and mauling.

http://www.independent.co.uk/sport/rugby/rugby-union/club-rugby/skrela-and-the-toulouse-pack-punish-leinster-1960319.html

 

Uh yes . Compared to football rugby is a finesse sport.

 

Given that GB grew up with rugby and now lives here, I'd trust his opinion on physicality of the sport compared to football than somebody who grew up here and has very limited exposure to rugby.

 

You just said:

Which is complete tripe. Rugby is a power game more than ever now, with limited subtitutions and no re-entry, and has been making the move towards that mode of play since it officially became professional in 1995.

 

I guess the test would be if he also player football. Be kind of hard to compare the two if you only played one of the sports.

 

Thomas' story is compelling enough, but he's not exactly a pioneer, as the SI piece points out:

I assume those two are no longer active.

 

As it happens, yes. When I was on an exchange program with the U.S. College I attended for the spring and summer semesters I worked as a WR with their football team through conditioning and spring practice.

Football may have bigger impacts in tackles, caused in part because of the weaponry you guys call padding, but the lack of subsitution and extra 20 minutes of playing time in rugby makes it the more physically demanding sport.

Apart from a fly half or full back, or even now other members of the backs, to handle the bulk of the kicking duties, everyone has to handle the ball, everyone has to defend, everyone has to attack.

Forwards join the passing line, backs join rucks and mauls, the parts are far more interchangable than they were in the past, and that's in part because everyone in the sport is far more athletic and powerful than 20 years ago since the move to sanctioned professionalism.

And Steak, I know that Justin Fashanu is dead, committed suicide in 1998 after a 17-year-old accused him of sexual assault.

 

Understand that I like both games but in terms of strategy I found rugby to much more of a finesse sport. Perhaps it was the team I played with but the international players tended to want to kick the ball more for touch and gain ground as opposed to the American ex football players who were content to stay in tight rucks and mauls and control the ball. Rugby has more running but football has more shear physical contact. Pick your poison.

Football players who are used to the 4 seconds back in the huddle pace quickly realize they better be in great shape running around the pitch for 40 minutes non stop.

 

But that's what you experienced at an amateur level.

At the professional level, when you have someone like French lock forward Sebastian Chabal (6-3, 254 pounds) ploughing into you either because he's running with the ball or tackling you, how is it not going to have the same impact as when Ray Lewis (6-1, 250) does it?

And this gets back to your original point. Rugby is now a power game played by powerful men like lock forward Roman Millo-Chluski of France (6-5, 267) or winger Sitiveni Sivivatu of New Zealand (6-1, 211).

To say it's a finesse sport when properly played is to ignore the way the game has shifted in the modern era.

 

I would hazard a guess that linebackers, safeties & runningbacks would be the ideal football players to try to convert to rugby. A really athletic kicker would probably be pretty good too.