USA

by Nigel Melville
Nigel Melville Direct blog 

Reflecting on my coaching career, the most important lesson I learnt was during an RFU Preliminary Coaching Course. The course as a whole was a disaster – due to the weather, the course was carried out on a beach bordering the north sea on a freezing cold winter weekend – as usual I was charged with developing the front row – the usual black humor that seems to work on some level for coach educators across the globe!

I had just finished my international playing career, coaching was of interest to me, so I enrolled on an RFU Preliminary Award coaching course.

The first slide on the opening day outline the 3 Principles of Play, as far as learning experiences go, that was about it for the weekend, but how that course changed my understanding of the game cannot be under estimated – I spent the whole of the weekend and the following week (and the rest of my coaching days) thinking about the principles of play.

Was it really that simple?

Why had no one explained this to me before?

How could this small piece of understanding have changed my playing career?

Today I will try to explain why it is even more important for players and coaches to understand the principles of play in the modern game, but before I do here are the 3 Principles of Play – and a fourth added at a later date..

1. Go Forward
2. Support
3. Continuity
4. Pressure

Go Forward

Principle No.1 is ‘Go Forward’. The game of rugby for me has always been about the ability of teams, units and individuals to create space – space is the holy grail of attack, space creates scoring opportunities, space needs to be exploited. It is ‘Go Forward’ that creates this space and running across the field that kills it.

It was always explained to me that there were only three ways to breach a defense, through, round or over it, this may be true but it doesn’t really mean a lot when it comes to creating a game plan. What it does say is that the defense has to be beaten in order to score, but lacks substance.

The Principles of Play on the other hand gives players and coaches an opportunity to create opportunities and then exploit them. A chance to be creative, innovative and think outside the box – but they rarely do.

‘Go Forward’ is pretty self explanatory, but its impact is significant and wide ranging.

If our goal is to create space to attack and score, ‘Go Forward’ helps us to understand how to manipulate the defense and create that space. A simple 2 v 1 when executed properly moves the defender and creates space for the support runner – it’s a simple as that. In team play, the impact of a ‘Go Forward’ run by an individual, a driven maul or line-out, a dynamic forward moving scrum all provide opportunities, we all do them, but we don’t always understand their impact or the opportunities they create.

All my players understood the impact of ‘Go Forward’, non better then Lawrence Dallaglio, who was not only a wonderfully powerful carrier of the ball, but understood the impact and opportunities each drive created for others. ‘Yes we scored in the corner’ he’d say, ‘but if the forwards hadn’t created the ‘Go Forward’ there would be a corner’ – and he was right!

As a coach the easiest way I found to explain ‘Go Forward’ was to use a piece of string on a table, stretch it out into a straight defensive wall, then have an imaginary ball carrier (your finger) hit the middle of the line and drive it back a few inches – what happens?

Firstly, the ball carrier is behind the defense and the defense has to retreat to an on-side position, but watch the ends of the string, the width of the defensive line shortens and we create space at either end.
When I first worked on ‘Go Forward’ with my teams, defenses were less structured and in many ways less predictable. Modern day defenses are pretty standard in their alignment, everyone stands about an arms length apart, the width of the defense is pretty predictable and doesn’t cover the whole width of the field – set up a defense on the field and start to look at the space and opportunities available to attack.

Now start to think about areas of the game where you can create ‘Go Forward’ and what happens to the defense in each scenario?

A player tackled behind the defensive line?
A player staying on his feet in the tackle and driving forward?
A ball carrier flopping at the feet of the defense?
A driven scrum?
A wheeled scrum?
A driving maul?
A static ruck?

All of the above provide different opportunities, but generally speaking the actions involving ‘Go Forward’ create far more opportunities than those that don’t.

‘Go Forward’ is a means to an end, but if you and your players don’t understand the opportunities created, you will simply not capitalize on your team mates hard work.

When coaches (and players) talk to me about fancy moves, I always ask them what it achieves, a simple pop ball on a decent line is probably easier to execute and creates the same if not better opportunities than a party trick.

If I asked your players to tell me the 3 principles of play – could they?

If I asked them to explain the impact of each – could they?

For more of Nigel's blog visit Nigel Melville Direct.

With an impressive resume as player, coach and administrator, Nigel David Melville took over as CEO and President of Rugby Operations of USA Rugby, the National Governing Body of the sport in America, in 2006.  In addition to his full time job promoting the sport in the U.S., Melville has launched his own blog, Nigel Melville Direct, to further the discussion and his passion for what it will take to make the U.S. a great rugby playing nation.

CLICK HERE to read more on Nigel Melville

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