Pick & Go pre-binding. Legal or not?

[Kawazaki]

The 'latch' on to add huge extra weight and heft to the ball carrier has long been a bugbear of mine. Exeter are the pre-eminent exponents of it but every side does it. Below is a try scored by Leicester and you can clearly see that two players bind on and set up a miniature scrum before the carrier has even picked up the ball. With this 330+kgs unit pushing forward the defender has little to no chance of stopping it. Worse still, I can see a serious injury occurring at this mismatch.

Is it legal to pre-bind like this before the ball has even been picked up?

Thoughts?

[Sandstorm]

Looks wrong to me.

Question.....doesn't the defence only have to be behind the last feet at a ruck (or is that a much older law?) So why can't the defence come right up passed the ball and still be onside?
Also would work when the defence makes that annoying centipede at a ruck.....

I might still be living in 2012, so I apologise.

[bok_viking]

Completely legal to pre-bind as long as the ball carrier is the first guy making contact and they come from behind instead of the side to latch on.. I think this became a popular way to do things since the ruck laws changed making it easier for a defending player to get their hands on the ball to affect a turnover when a ball carrier does not even get proper chance to place a ball for his team to regather. So the pre-bind is a way to protect the ball against the defending team in case the carrier goes to ground, creating an instant ruck so that defenders cannot get their hands on the ball in my opinion.

[Kawazaki]

Completely legal to pre-bind as long as the ball carrier is the first guy making contact and they come from behind instead of the side to latch on.. I think this became a popular way to do things since the ruck laws changed making it easier for a defending player to get their hands on the ball to affect a turnover when a ball carrier does not even get proper chance to place a ball for his team to regather. So the pre-bind is a way to protect the ball against the defending team in case the carrier goes to ground, creating an instant ruck so that defenders cannot get their hands on the ball in my opinion.

Then according to that the example above is probably illegal.

[clydecloggie]

It may look wrong, but I'm struggling to come up with a Law that this would fall foul of.

The ball is at the back of the ruck, the ball carrier-to-be is in a position to pick up the ball, he is the front player of that 'pod', his team mates are behind the hindmost foot of the ruck, and I don't think there is any law that says team mates cannot bind on each other unless they are part of the ruck.

I don't disagree with you that it's perhaps a little unfair, and potentially dangerous, but as it stands it's entirely legal?

Edit: unless you would consider this a flying wedge or cavalry charge, which is prohibited as per law 9.22

[Insane_Homer]

I can't find anything in the Laws that prohibits it directly, and it doesn't meet the criteria of the flying wedge or cavalry charge.

As long as those players are not preventing the ball carrier from being tackled (they are bound behind him) then it's ok. If they are obstructing in any way then it's illegal.

Closest I can think of is the lineout rules, where you can't bind of lift before the ball is thrown in and you can bind to the jumper ahead of him. Opp can then sack the ball carrier by tacking him.

So I guess to prevent it, you'd need an amendment stating the you can't bind to the receiver until either the ball is passed (same as lineout throw) or received (seems more sensible).

[clydecloggie]

I can't find anything in the Laws that prohibits it directly, and it doesn't meet the criteria of the flying wedge or cavalry charge.

As long as those players are not preventing the ball carrier from being tackled (they are bound behind him) then it's ok. If they obstructing in any way then it's illegal.

Looking at the definitions, it's clearly not a cavalry charge, but it could arguably be a flying wedge - the wording is a bit ambiguous:

"An illegal type of attack, which usually happens near the goal line, when the attacking team is awarded a penalty or free-kick. The kicker taps the ball and starts the attack, either by driving towards the goal line or by passing to a team-mate who drives forward. Immediately, team-mates bind on each side of the ball-carrier in a wedge formation before engaging the opposition. Often one or more of these team-mates is in front of the ball-carrier."

If you read it straight up, it appears to say the flying wedge requires a penalty or free kick as its starting point. In which case the Leicester try is not from a flying wedge. However, if you read the entire first sentence as just a bit of context on when this would usually happen, but not as contributing information to the restrictive part of the definition, then the rest of it (binding in a wedge formation before engaging the opposition) actually does describe the Leicester try. Precedent for reading it this way is provided by the last sentence, which does not contribute to the definition at all as it describes something you might or might not see during a flying wedge attack. So the definition is already a bit loose...

Morale of the story - a relatively minor tweak to the definition of the flying wedge would outlaw this type of play.

[Insane_Homer]

Yup, simply remove "when the attacking team is awarded a penalty or free-kick" solves that problem.

Seems logical that if it's illegal at the pen/free-kick then it should also be so in open play/ruck/maul.

[Kawazaki]

In the example in the OP, the latcher nearest the camera looks like he engages contact first or at the very least simultaneously with the ball-carrier.

If nothing else, this is very dangerous. Back in my day, the ball-carrier would engage contact and then teammates would set up a maul and then drive forward over the line, much like happens at lineouts. This is something very different.

[Sandstorm]

In the example in the OP, the latcher nearest the camera looks like he engages contact first or at the very least simultaneously with the ball-carrier.

If nothing else, this is very dangerous. Back in my day, the ball-carrier would engage contact and then teammates would set up a maul and then drive forward over the line, much like happens at lineouts. This is something very different.

The pre-engage by the bloke at the back could be dangerous if the two in front change direction or get hit really hard - neck at risk.

[Woddy]

It is definitely a flying wedge, as the attackers are bound together before making contact with the defence. It is thus against the rules. Whether some attackers might be in front of or behind the ball-carrier makes no difference other than to add a further possible infraction of obstruction if in front.

I think it's become tolerated if (a) the defence are close (so that in real time it's difficult to tell whether other attackers bound as contact is made with the defence) and/or (b) it looks like a split from a maul. Technically (b) is complicated depending on if and how/where the defence are engaging the maul and in particular the off-split (as it were).

But my reading of the laws is that even one man supporting a ball-carrier as he drives into a tackle is technically a flying wedge.

[Niegs]

Good discussion above, but lending my voice to say it's something I'd like to see banned as well.

Yes, everyone can do it, but some are better than others at it and get away with using it to seal off the ruck. It's even more effective, I think, at the women's level because most don't have the upper body strength to stop it. The only way I can think of combating it is to - very riskily - get under the ball carrier (probably impossible in the clip above), get steamrolled and prevent a try / tie it in for a scrum. Given how things are going, defenders would probably get pinged for not rolling away!

At the very least, I'd like to see it banned at amateur / youth levels the same way there's U19 scrum differences, kids can't do a 'squeeze ball', etc. I can't say I've seen in here at all, but have definitely seen it in Kiwi, South African, English schoolboy matches posted to youtube.

[Niegs]

Leinster getting close to flying wedge with their taps in this.

[Margin__Walker]

Yeah, that surely can't be legal. It's like the refs need an actual directive to start applying to the laws here.

[Flockwitt]

Good discussion. Another point is do the players even have to be bound to the ball carrier? Could somebody else come into that pod binding to one of the binders as long as they are behind the ball?

They should just penalize the move outright.