Varsity Cup are experimenting again … Next year they will be trialing a new points-scoring system.
Thanks to a special dispensation from the International Rugby Board, conversions will be worth three points and penalties and drop-goals will be worth just two points.
So four penalties or four drop-goals will equal one converted try on the scoreboard, the intention being to put the emphasis back on scoring tries to win matches.
Andre Watson makes pretty good observation: “One would think this experiment would definitely lead to more tries… but you’d also imagine that a few more penalties will be conceded on purpose.”
So will this lead to referees getting grumpy and handing out more yellow cards?
I am also struggling to see why so much emphasis was put on the conversion? Would it not have been simpler to have increased the value of the try to six points? Varsity Cup’s Duitser Bosman says they don’t want to downplay the value of having a good kicker … But the reality is that teams will only see the true value of the new points system by scoring tries close to the poles.
If the aim is to see more attacking rugby, and to see more time with ball in hand, perhaps it would have made more sense to reward tries scored out wide the same way tries scored close to the poles will be?
But I like the fact that they are at least trying to encourage try scoring …
The 2012 Varsity Cup Rugby season gets underway on Monday, January 30 with the Varsity Shield, followed by the Cup and Young Guns the following Monday (February 6) and the Steinhoff Koshuisrugby Championships on February 13.
The fixtures for all 2012 Varsity Cup Rugby tournaments can be found on www.varsitycup.co.za.
In line with that, it could work to do an a-la-basketball three points line for kicks outside the circle. And conversions to the right and left would qualify…. In fact, just use the lineout lines…