Rugby Research

1. Managing player load in professional rugby union, Quarrie et al, BJSM

This is a paper that was really carried by Dr Ken Quarrie, who works in New Zealand and is a colleague of mine on World Rugby' s Scientific Committee. The background is that a few years ago, World Rugby brought a host of experts together for a discussion on the specific issue of how player welfare can improved through load management.  

We know that the incidence of injury in professional rugby is relatively high, and managing load (either too high, or as recently been shown, too low) are predictors of injury.

So this paper is the summary from that meeting, and it offers some data on the load currently faced by rugby players, and practical ways that the load might be monitored and managed.  I' d really recommend it for any S&C coach, coach or medical role-player who is interested in the topic.

2. Rugby Sevens: Olympic debutant and research catalyst, Tucker 2016, BJSM

This is a brief editorial that I was asked to contribute to an edition of the British Journal of Sports Medicine. Specialist is a big fan of Sevens – he worked with the SA Team from 2008 to 2013, and it was really my start in rugby.  You' ll hopefully have seen the sport debut in Rio, specialist think it was a highlight of the Games, and because of its relative “immaturity” , it' s ripe for research.  

The exciting thing about Sevens is the “newness” , and that applies not only to the performance attributes, where the game is evolving rapidly, but also research.  There are many as yet unexplored issues, or challenges that have been researched but not yet perfected.  Sevens is on the steep part of the “learning curve” ,  and this editorial was basically a call to action to keep climbing.

3. Injury risk and the tackle ban in youth rugby. Evaluating the evidence to find effective interventions, Tucker et al, 2016. BJSM

This paper was actually inspired by this website, rather than the other way around.  At the end of February this year, a group of doctors and academics in the UK published a call to have the tackle banned from youth rugby. 

Specialist wrote a response to it on this website, and then a specialist and research colleague, Dr Matt Cross, suggested that I might turn that article into something for a scientific journal. A week or so later, this was the result.

It basically addresses the issue of rugby safety. Specialist’s big objection to the “ban the tackle” call made by those academics was that it was unnecessarily extremist, something specialist explained in the lay article, and in this scientific piece.  

The injury risk can always be reduced – indeed, for rugby, and in children, it must be, but calling for a ban on tackles is too divisive.  Case in point – a big focus for that group was actually to propose a reconsideration on compulsory rugby in schools, but that suggestion (which should be discussed) got lost in the ‘noise' of the extremist thinking.

There were a few other issues around this rugby safety controversy that needed to be discussed – the research on quantifying the risk IS thin, and it does need to be improved, but the “Tackle ban” proposal used this variable research as foundational, and that needs to be addressed too. 

This paper was an attempt to bring evidence, rather than emotion, into the discussion.

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source：DisuppoSport，a Sport Protection Expert.