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#Post#: 145810--------------------------------------------------
Collier on scrums
DIR By: Yareet
Date: December 11, 2025, 5:41 pm
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www.thetimes.com/sport/rugby-union/article/save-scrums-dark-arts-will-collier-castres-28lwj6ctk
Behind a paywall, unfortunately
#Post#: 145813--------------------------------------------------
Re: Collier on scrums
DIR By: deadlyfrom5yardsout
Date: December 12, 2025, 3:28 am
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Copy & Paste Pretty Please???
#Post#: 145815--------------------------------------------------
Re: Collier on scrums
DIR By: robyt
Date: December 12, 2025, 3:57 am
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Rugby union can’t grow if we depower the scrum — instead we must
demystify it, just as UFC has been transformed by releasing the
secrets of its dark arts
Will Collier, Castres and former England tight-head prop
The scrum is a unique physical confrontation in sport: 16 men
locked together in a war for inches, with close to two tonnes of
weight travelling through them
Ever wondered what a scrum feels like? Let me tell you.
The referee’s whistle goes. It’s time. I draw a deep breath,
running mental checks. What happened last time? Whose feed is
it? How much did their loose-head tuck in his shoulder? Should I
adjust my bind? None of this really matters. The minute the ball
comes in, all bets are off.
The scrum is an art and like all art, to truly succeed you have
to exist on another plane of consciousness. It is a devilish
dance, where each step can have devastating consequences.
As my mentor, Adam Jones, once said, quoting his idol Maverick
in Top Gun: “If you think, you’re dead.”
The best scrums come when you aren’t consciously thinking. The
pack around you is reacting together to the flow of energy
rippling through you, waiting for an opportunity to strike or
bracing to be humbled. To have eight men with confidence in each
other to execute this skill consistently takes an enormous
amount of time and, above all, trust.
If I have the energy, I like to look into the faces of my pack
at a scrum to see they have that hunger in their eyes.
Collier plays for Castres in France, where a scrum penalty is
often celebrated like a try
With my left arm, I take my bind on my hooker; not too tight. I
need space to manoeuvre my shoulder to block their hooker from
attacking me. I find my footing, placing my left foot about two
centimetres to the right of my hooker’s outside foot and I bring
it back to just behind his inside foot. I take a three-quarter
squat and I offer my waistband to the second-row to bind on. The
slightest mistake from him and I will get drilled.
I wait to feel my flanker’s head and shoulder tight to my
outside leg. On the “crouch” call, I take another breath, lower
myself down and start bracing. This is when the first weight
comes on. “Bind” is called and the pressure starts building.
Early in a game, often I feel welcome clicks through my neck and
spine as my body adjusts to the force. One last deep breath,
then the referee calls “set”.
It is dark, claustrophobic, painful and terrifying. You can’t
breathe. You can’t see. And for reasons I will now try to
explain, I love it to my bones.
If you are part of a dominant scrum, it provides unmatched
ecstasy. You have been to such a dark place together, have
survived unscathed and then emerged as the most powerful force.
By contrast, if you are retreating, that’s when you really find
out about yourself and those around you.
The hours of spinal compression you have gone through in
training, all the opposition analysis you have done; your ego,
professional pride and money-making ability can be crushed in a
few seconds.
In a sport where everything is measured, statistics cannot show
the psychological damage that a dominant scrum inflicts, not
only to the forward pack but to the backs who watch the
dismantling of their biggest players.
South Africa’s scrum, which dominated Ireland during the autumn
internationals, symbolises their sporting culture, their
toughness as a nation, and has powered them to back-to-back
World Cup triumphs
The scrum is a unique physical confrontation in sport: 16 men
locked together in a war for inches, with close to two tonnes of
weight travelling through them, weight that is simultaneously
trying to lift, slide and twist them apart. Mixed martial
artists, boxers and NFL linemen, while all savage and skilful,
do not compare to scrummagers.
For rugby to grow, we have to fully embrace this spectacle. For
too long we have shied away from it like that embarrassing uncle
you are avoiding at a wedding. A bit like that black sheep in
the family, once you have had a few drinks and get to know
front-rowers, you find they’re the most interesting people in
the room.
Yes, a messy, collapsing and continuously reset scrum is painful
to watch. It is a nightmare for referees who have no idea why or
how this is happening, and it can kill all momentum in a game.
Sure, we can fix these things, but waiting for a few seconds is
a small price to pay to have this brutal confrontation as part
of the sport.
Scrum down
The number of scrums in Six Nations and Rugby Championship games
has been declining year on year
How, though, can anyone appreciate the scrummaging enigma code
if they don’t know anything about it?
It breaks me when television cameras pan to a moody shot of a
wing as the forwards pack down, or when a dominant scrum is met
with silence by commentators. I do not blame the cameraman or
the pundit — it is difficult to understand scrummaging from
afar.
Scrums are not only won by packs who are heavier and lift more.
It is a ruthless combination of teamwork, trust, raw strength,
physics and psychological warfare.
This is where we must champion the scrum coaches — the gurus who
know what is really happening. They will hate me for suggesting
this, as many prefer to operate in the shadows, but we have to
drag them into the spotlight.
Let’s start banging the drum for scrums. More live in-match
interviews with scrum coaches, who can give tactical
explanations, would be a huge step. What about more statistics
and graphics to show which pack is dominant and why? Show
players’ gym numbers too, to impress fans.
The UFC has transformed supporters’ understanding of wrestling,
jiu-jitsu and ground-based fighting. Fans used to roll their
eyes when a fight went to the floor, but now have been educated
through television coverage to understand what goes into that
craft. Series such as UFC Embedded have lifted the lid on
training and analysis, showing how fighters passionately
practise their techniques.
We can do the same for scrums, which are so fundamental to rugby
union at every level. Rugby provides a home for different types
of people, of all shapes and sizes. The sport is meant to be for
everyone, and the props in the grassroots game are often the
lifeblood of their clubs. They recognise what the game has given
to the slower and larger blokes, and therefore appreciate
rugby’s enduring community spirit.
I am in awe of the dominant scrums of rugby history. Leicester
Tigers had their ABC club of Graham Rowntree, Richard Cockerill
and Darren Garforth, who defined the most elite members’ club in
the game. They represented everything that club and city was
about, and their legacy is still imbued in the Tigers’ DNA.
I play at Castres in the Top 14, and there are fans that come up
to me to talk about the dominant scrums (and punch-ups) that
made Gérard Cholley an icon here in the 1970s. He, Alain Paco
and Robert Paparemborde, the French front row, were said to be
capable of curdling blood. In France, a scrum penalty is often
celebrated like a try. Most fans will not understand what has
happened, but they appreciate the skill involved.
In July 2024, World Rugby outlawed calling a scrum from a mark,
as South Africa famously did 20 metres from their own tryline in
the 2023 World Cup quarter-final against France. It was one of
the greatest pieces of scrum theatre we have seen, but now it is
impossible to replicate. Now some want to remove the ability to
send weaker props to the sin-bin after multiple infringements
because of South Africa’s masterclass against Ireland this
autumn.
The answer is not to depower the scrum, but to demystify it.
South Africa’s scrum symbolises their sporting culture, their
toughness as a nation, and has powered them to back-to-back
World Cup triumphs.
If I were World Rugby, I would send journalists to queue up at
the farm of Daan Human, the Springboks scrum coach, to gain an
insight into how he builds such a formidable unit.
The scrum defines rugby union. We must celebrate, not belittle
it. It is time to release the secrets of the scrum’s dark arts,
or else the sport will lose its soul.
#Post#: 145816--------------------------------------------------
Re: Collier on scrums
DIR By: Rugbycat
Date: December 12, 2025, 4:03 am
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The french have started to follow some of the laws around the
scrum.
HTML https://www.ruck.co.uk/about-time-latest-rugby-law-change-finally-fixes-scrum-feeds/#:~:text=Sale%20Sharks-,%E2%80%9CAbout%20time%E2%80%9D%20%E2%80%93%20Latest%20rugby%20law%20change%20finally%20fixes%20scrum,We%20want%20more%20equity.
#Post#: 145817--------------------------------------------------
Re: Collier on scrums
DIR By: deadlyfrom5yardsout
Date: December 12, 2025, 6:05 am
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Thank you robyt! You can come again! What should be outlawed are
fancy Dan Props with a sidestep....
#Post#: 145822--------------------------------------------------
Re: Collier on scrums
DIR By: T-Bone
Date: December 12, 2025, 6:44 am
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Good article..thanks for sharing
#Post#: 145846--------------------------------------------------
Re: Collier on scrums
DIR By: Rocker
Date: December 12, 2025, 3:33 pm
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Very interesting and insightful article. Thank you 😊
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