League has overtaken rugby at the art of the attacking kick. Paul Lewis looks at how kicking has evolved in both codes – and how rugby’s aimless kicking could improve.
It wasn't so long ago that league followers used to deride rugby as kick and clap' - referring to the old form of the game where kicking ruled as a tactical and even a strategic manoeuvre.
In comparison, in those days, the sight of a league player kicking the ball was like watching a hippo trying to light a candle.
Times have changed.
On the evidence of Super 14 and NRL this year, league and rugby have almost changed roles as regards kicking.
In rugby, kicking has become a kind of default; a response rather than a creative enterprise; almost a kind of mental block. Forced to deal with new rules which pack defences and spread them across the park, Super 14 and other teams kick the ball behind those defences to gain territory.
They then assemble their own defence, rush up towards the catcher of the ball and try to force a mistake. Kicking in the game of rugby union has become almost completely defensive - or, at best, defensive offence.
Because they do not want to surrender possession by kicking the ball out - where the opposition would most likely win the lineout - rugby teams surrender possession anyway, by kicking directly to them. They then try to smother any counter-attack and turn over the ball.
It's illogical - but there is little choice with the game structured the way it is. Fans at rugby matches and watching on TV often have to endure long kicking duels with seemingly little plan or purpose. At least in the kick and clap' days, the kick was followed by applause. These days, the kicking is followed by a puzzled or bored silence.
In the kick and clap' days, at least the kick was a legitimate weapon - an integral part of the 'percentage game'. If you had a majority interest in the possession and territory stakes, chances were that you won the game.
The kick won territory and, although it surrendered possession, lineouts in pre-lifting times were untidy, messy things - but they at least offered a decent chance of winning the ball against the throw. With territory and position came the chance of a mistake or an infringement and the goalkickers benefited.
Tries were bonuses, with the ball often flung around only when a gap had to be bridged towards the end of a game.
Pedestrian, perhaps, compared to today's high-octane game. Some would say the Northern Hemisphere still play it like this, with kicking playing far too important a role in what should be entertainment.
But at least kicking in the kick and clap' era was a strategic ploy and recognisable as such to the fans, even if they didn't always agree with it. In today's rugby, the kicks can appear aimless (even if they're not) and bereft of creativity.
Contrast that with rugby league. The kick has become an attacking weapon. It is a targeted thing - the up-and-under at the end of the six tackles, often producing a try; or the clever short kick, as spectacularly pulled off by Stacey Jones against Manly recently. Rugby's short kicks inevitably seem to be a handover of possession in the cluttered, defensive world of union.
There is also the kick targeted at forcing your opposition behind their own goal-line - meaning they have to kick the ball back to you where you get six more tackles with which to attack.
League has also instituted the 40/20 kick - where a kick out of your own 40-metre zone sees the kicking team retain possession in an attacking part of the ground if it bounces into touch in the opposition's 20-metre zone.
There's another way of looking at this. Try writing down the names of those tactical kickers in the Super 14 who are truly adept at the practice - kicks that consistently produce a defined result, whether that be a long touchfinder, a grubber, a kick to a lock hovering on the sideline near the opposing goal or an up-and-under.
Dan Carter, Matt Giteau, ummm, Morne Steyn of the Bulls... then a host who are good kickers but perhaps do not quite have this measure of control.
Then do the same exercise in rugby league, looking for those adept at the scoring kick after five tackles, the kick forcing a team back into goal, or the clever short kick, a la Stacey Jones.
Let's see... Brett Kimmorley (Bulldogs), Darren Lockyer (Broncos), Matt Orford (Manly), Jamie Lyon (Manly), Cooper Cronk (Storm), Scott Prince (Titans), Johnathan Thurston (Cowboys), Jamie Soward (Dragons). There are more and we haven't even touched on Joel Moon, whose boot looks like being a useful weapon for the Warriors this year, Jones and a host of others maybe not quite up to the standard of those already named but still more than useful at the attacking kick - including Cameron Smith (Storm), Peter Wallace (Broncos), Trent Barrett (Sharks) and more.
Then look at those consistently adept at catching attacking kicks and scoring or creating a try from them - in league, Israel Folau (Broncos), Manu Vatuvei (Warriors), Greg Inglis (Storm), Colin Best (Rabbitohs), Krisnan Inu (Eels), Shaun Kenny-Dowall (Roosters) and many others.
In rugby: Errr, umm, Ali Williams, maybe? Kevin O'Neill? Maybe not.
The almost blank sheet in rugby suggests strongly that the code does not spend a great deal of time practising the attacking kick; certainly nowhere near as long as league teams do, making sure their players are adept at the timing, the leap and the handling required.
It's no surprise that league leads the way in the kicking stakes these days, as it has been more innovative in this department for some time. Many rugby folk want to believe that the colourful genius-at-times that was Carlos Spencer invented the banana kick' but in reality it was the man regarded as league's best tactical kicker ever - Andrew Johns.
It would be misleading to say league players are better kickers of the ball than rugby players. The fact is that it is the structure of the game which has turned rugby's kicking into a mostly defensive, mostly hopeful, percentage ploy.
The Bulls, in their recent away win over the Hurricanes, showed that the kick was a major part of their armoury, using the kick-chase-tackle-smother-force errors strategy to good effect, even though it was ugly beyond belief.
It doesn't have to be like that. One man with an almost unique perspective on the evolution of the kicking game - because of his time in both codes - is former All Black coach and director of football at the Warriors, John Hart.
He is at pains to make it clear he doesn't want to "diss" rugby and that he still loves the game - but agrees that kicking in rugby league is much more targeted at present than in rugby union.
"I think rugby union players and coaches see kicking as a way to drag down opponents by kicking it behind their defence and trying to make them make mistakes. I think it puts them - and the game - in a pretty defensive mode," he says.
"It also surprises me that rugby does not make more use of the up-and-under. It is still a difficult weapon to defend against.
"Allowing the defending team to mark the ball in their own 22 doesn't help," he adds, "but it can still be a powerful thing outside the 22 and I am surprised more rugby teams have not developed the attacking kick and the skills needed to re-gather possession."
Hart is not one of those who thinks the kick should be done away with or reduced in rugby.
"It has a key place in the game but it is becoming the first resort too often. Not enough attention is maybe being paid to getting numbers behind the ball and moving it wide quickly - the Chiefs did that against the Blues to very good effect."
Not that Hart thinks all is rosy in the garden of league kicking either. Last year, the NRL toyed with the idea of an experiment limiting kicks for the corner after a wide body of feeling that there was too much predictable play and scoring from kicks and that the ball should be kept more in hand. The predictability of dummy-half run, dummy-half run, one-out run and kick for the corner was behind the move, which hasn't resulted in action yet but is still on the radar.
In addition, anyone watching either code will see quickly that rugby union players kick the ball a great deal further than their league counterparts.
"It has always amazed me that league teams don't often want to carve off large amounts of territory with a penalty kick to touch," says Hart. "Often what you see is that the team is just happy to kick it out and get it over the touchline, even if it is only a short distance.
"The argument is that if you miss the touchline, you are giving away six tackles to the other side. But, if you could kick like rugby union players kick, you'd be putting huge pressure on the opponents when you get the ball back for six tackles closer to their line. League players are not great at the long spiral punt into touch."
There are risks, of course, and many will have noted that Moon missed one such kick for touch when trying for distance in the match against Manly.
So what to do? Hart suggests three main changes to put a bit of zip back into rugby union kicking and the game as a whole:
1. Ban the mark
"I have never understood why you are essentially given a free kick for being able to catch the ball," says Hart. "It is a basic skill of the game - why get rewarded for it? Better instead to make the up-and-under contestable within the 22 and watch the kick come back as an attacking weapon."
The theory is that the packed defences will thin a little as they have to station defenders for catching and support.
2. Bring the 40/20 kick (or a derivation of it) into rugby
"I think that has some merit in rugby too - so the good tactical kickers can be rewarded by gaining ground and keeping possession by gaining the throw into the lineout in an attacking position." Again, the theory is that defences would have to thin a little out wide - where opportunities are best - to guard against this attacking kick.
3. Develop the up-and-under
Few rugby teams practise the art of landing the ball in the desired area and the aerial skills needed to regather it behind the massed defences that slow the game and bore crowds. Doing so would add some welcome relief to current predictable play and would also result in teams developing aerial specialists who can plant doubt in the mind of defences.
* We asked the New Zealand Rugby Union about speaking to kicking coach Mick Byrne about this story but nothing happened.