I agree that there is fairly limited scope for growing the game. However, fans (particularly in New Zealand and Australia) have been turning away from rugby for a number of years now. It is a fallacy to suggest that we will just continue to "watch it anyway" when negative defence orientated rugby continues to be the winning strategy as exhibited by the last three World Cups.

The whole tenet of your argument pivots on the idea that the introduction of the new laws is solely as a way to "grow the game". It is equally valid to argue that it is to stop the haemorrhaging of the fan base to sports such as basketball, league and football.

In any case, the reasoning behind the ELVs extends far beyond a well-intentioned desire to grow the game. The ELVs are being tested to encourage attacking play over negative, defensive play. They are also intended to simplify areas of the game and stamp out points being conceded directly due to subtle misinterpretations such as whether the ruck has or has not been formed.

I have not contributed to the message board since immediately prior to the RWC quarter final when I wrote a horribly prophetic piece about how the French could beat the All Blacks. But as the debate about the worthiness of the ELVs intensifies I think it is worthwhile making a contribution.    

Any intelligent discussion on these experimental variations requires that we look at the pros and cons of each ELV individually and then the way they all work together.

Corner flags, assistant referee appellation:
These laws seem to be something of a change-for-change-sake type of law. I am indifferent to them. If the flag ELV simplifies the laws then I guess it is a good thing: It will probably do nothing to "grow the game" but may make it more easily understood for newbies?

Kicking out on the full from the 22:
In the recent Six Nations match between France and England, England would win a lineout on their own ten metre line and then proceed to pass the ball a good 15 metres back into their own twenty two and kick for touch. They did this repeatedly, ensuring that there was no danger of any turnover ball being conceded in their own half, and that no rugby was played for long swathes of the game. I must stress that this is not just an English tactic, and it has proven to be very effective. Traditionalists will argue that the slow walk back for the lineout and a reliance on the kicking game is what rugby is all about. Those new to the game, and those who prefer to watch running rugby would argue that the new kicking law encourage counter attack, adds a new dimension to tactical kicking, reduces the slow walks to the lineouts, keeps the ball in play longer and speeds up the game.

This law certainly doesn't simplify anything, or alter the penalty count, but encourages ball in hand rugby, and can be classified as exclusively introduced to make rugby union more digestible to the masses. So I agree that this is solely a "grow the game" law. Purists, traditionalists and locks may be disappointed that it reduces the number of lineouts in the game. The fundamental question around this ELV is whether it is more desirable to have a slow game with marginally more lineouts (the number of lineouts is actually not THAT much greater under the old laws because the ball was in play for shorter periods), OR to have a faster game with more ball-in-hand enterprising rugby.

One observation I would make is that set play orientated rugby reduces the effectiveness of "scratch teams" such as the Lions and swings the pendulum in the direction of professional, wealthy teams with more time together. Hence this ELV helps to level the playing field slightly.

Personally I am in favour of this law change for the reasons above even though I was originally highly sceptical and worried about the reduction in the importance of beanpole locks. It is hard to argue that there is as much place for beanpoles under the new laws as there used to be. This may be a bad thing, or it may be something of a leveller too.

Free Kicks instead of penalties:
This ELV massively reduces the emphasis on place kicking, increases the ball in play time, encourages attacking rugby and reduces the number of misinterpretations that result in 3 points being conceded. One frustration that ALL rugby union fans will have had at one time or another, is where their team has conceded three points due to a player action which appeared legitimate or at the very least was not the only infringement at the breakdown. By giving the wronged team a free kick they win the opportunity to attack but do not get an automatic score increase based solely on the quality of their kicker and the place where the infringement was conceded. Who can not say they have been frustrated beyond belief when some perceived minor scrum binding misdemeanour resulted in three points?

This law variation is clearly not an effort to "grow the game" but an effort to reduce the match-swinging gravity of referee error. This is a laudable intention, as referees are, after all, human and in the professional era players are actively encouraged to push the boundaries of the laws as far as possible.

Traditionalists may argue that this ELV will encourage more offending because there is less chance of scoring from the infringement, and that it will swing the pendulum in favour of fitter ball-in-hand style teams. The flipside is that instead of three points being up for grabs, the potential consequence of infringing is now 7 points, and the repeat infringing provisions in the laws can be enforced in the event that a cynical team looks to exploit this.

Personally I am in favour of this, because I still believe that the emphasis on rugby should not be about milking penalties. I am not a fan of the entire emphasis hinging on the goal kicker's ability, and I am heartily sick of teams squandering their possession in order to secure field position so they could extract penalties. This was the prevalent throughout the world cup (refer France in the quarter final, Argentina in all their matches, South Africa in the final and England in all their knock out matches).

In essence this law can be seen as an effort to "grow the game" but also to lessen the impact of referee interpretations and encourage ball in play.

5m at the scrum:
This law is simply a necessity if teams are to have a valid reason to choose scrummaging over free kicks. Without the 5m, scrummaging would seldom be favourable to gaining 10m instantly from a quick tap. It encourages attacking rugby, increases the number of scrums (back toward what it used to be like in the eighties almost) and gives teams tactical options.

Traditionalists may argue that there is less need to drive the opposition backwards under these laws and that the focus again changes to the ability to get ball quickly to the backline. Perhaps this isn't an all bad thing though and we may see fewer international props having their careers curtailed due to the enormous impact of the shunt? While I am not a huge fan of the change in emphasis from forward aggression to back play from the scrum I will concede that it has increased the attacking rugby from the scrum and I am warming to it.

Offside at the tackle (and a digression to the intention of the ELVs at the breakdown):
This is one of the MOST significant changes to the laws. The current (non ELV) laws almost actively discourage linebreaks and offloading: After a linebreak, if unsupported, a player is almost certain to concede a turnover or penalty at the ensuing tackle. Traditionalists will argue that rugby is a team game about support. Those new to the game, and those who believe skilful running rugby and offloading is what union should be about, are often baffled when their team can make break after break only to be defeated by "lazy runners" and penalties.

The original intention of the expanded ELVs trialled in Australia was to entirely remove the concept of a ruck. Tackles and rucks would be one and the same, removing the dreadful grey area about when the ruck is formed, and the multiplicity of laws defining what was and wasn't a ruck. The sad truth is that NO "ruck" in the modern game matches the description of a ruck in law. Theoretically, the ball may not be played out of a ruck with the hands (in theory it should be played back with the feet until clear of the hindmost foot of the ruck and only touched when the "ball is out"). Due to bodies, hands etc in the way, this has proven impractical, and the laws need to be amended in some way to reflect the reality of the ruck. Almost every ruck in the game has at least one player from either team infringing in some way and the referee is called upon repeatedly to use his discretion. This is untenable in the modern professional game, and thus the ELVs set out to address this.

The original ELV idea was to legalise ALL hands in the ruck (provided that players using their hands were on their feet), and to remove the rules about needing to be "bound" over the ball to form a ruck. This was well intentioned- it would remove a lot of the ambiguity surrounding the breakdown, simplify it in law, and legitimise the ubiquitous practice of the attacking halfback reaching in to extract the ball.

However concerns arose over the chaotic nature of breakdowns in the Australian and Stellenbosch trials and the Super14 coaches agreed to a modified concept which kept rucks and tackles separate and did not legalise hands at the ruck, but allowed them at the tackle. This actually COMPLICATES the breakdown area under the S14 ELVs. They moved slightly toward the ELV concept by adding the offside line to the tackle, but kept the arcane and confusing definitions of what constitutes a ruck.

The addendum about making it illegal to draw the halfback into the ruck has been added when it really makes no sense under the current law as it is written. By definition the halfback is not part of the ruck, so by definition, dragging him into the ruck is interference (tackling a player without the ball) and thus is a penalisable offence. The reason the addendum has been made is presumably simply to clarify and reduce the prevalence of this practice. Note that halfbacks shouldn't really be reaching in with their hands under current law anyway!

This law is clearly a compromise and certainly was never solely intended to "grow the game". Instead, it was intended to legitimise current real-world practice, simplify the game, encourage line breaking, offloading and a fair contest for possession. Personally I think the compromise is unsatisfactory and that the whole new ELV breakdown concept should've been trialled properly, then rejected out of hand, or adopted. As it stands, under the Super 14 versions of the ELVs there has been no amendment that legalises the extraction of the ball from the ruck with hands, so it fails to fix the contentious nature of the breakdown at all. One simple law variation could've been to allow hands in the ruck by players of the attacking team (on their feet) to make halfback practice legitimate. But this would probably have discouraged a fair contest for possession and would've done nothing to reduce or simplify the job of the referee.

It doesn't surprise or upset me at all that slower teams who used to rely on their ability to cut down a line breaking player or his support from behind are suffering at the hands of this variation (ie. The Bulls).

One interesting question that arises from this is whether an offside line would be introduced at the tackle in the Sevens variation of rugby union. If it were, I suspect the game of sevens would become far less contested, with scoring occurring far too often and easily. What appears to work well in fifteens could prove unviable in sevens - food for thought.

Use it or lose it at the ruck:
This is one of the more controversial ELVs but in practice happens less often than one would expect. It has encouraged quick play from rucks and seen an end to the interminable incontestable slow ruck ball so prevalent in the Northern Hemisphere. The key to making this law work is the necessity for the referee to police illegal use of hands at the breakdown. If he fails to do this, defending teams stand to gain enormously from deliberately killing the ball. This has been a bugbear for me in recent weeks where clear and deliberate ball killing has not been penalised (or "free kicked") correctly.

The concept is not a flawed one if referees stamp out illegal use of the hands. It is much more questionable whether this is a good law if hands in the breakdown by players on their feet were legalised as per the extended version of the ELVs. This is another reason why I think they have missed a beat by not adopting and testing the whole tackle/ruck ELVs in the Super 14.

Not straight quick throw ins:
This ELV simply makes legal what has in practice crept into the game. It was difficult to police (because by definition the ref and assistants are never in line with a quick throw in), and simply serves to speed up the game and give the attacking team more options. It is hard to see a fault with this ELV.

Lifting and pre gripping at the lineout:
This ELV simply makes standard practice legal. Can't be a bad thing.

Some conclusions:
It is still early days and I fear we haven't yet seen teams trying to negatively exploit the ELVs. There is a principle in Super 14 to play an enterprising, entertaining brand of rugby. This is at odds with win at all costs test rugby, and I would very much like to see tests played under the ELVs. I'd also like to see some teams (perhaps those at the bottom of the Super 14 table with nothing to lose) really cheating and spoiling.

There is scope for games to degenerate into ceaseless force back and midfield bombs, and I would be keen to see teams trying to use this strategy (not because I think it would be entertaining, but because I think it could be effective and challenge the viability of some of the laws). The frenetic pace and need to counter attack, rather than kick for touch, means a strategy of perpetual kicking ala Argentina in RWC07, could lead to opposition errors and turnovers at the expense of attacking ball in hand rugby.

Apologies for such a lengthy analysis of the effects and side effects of the ELVs. I haven't drawn many conclusions here but simply expressed my understanding of them and my own preferences from what I have seen to date, having watched many games from the MARC and S14. My jury is still out on the tackle/ruck ELVs and I think some of the variations have been compromised in the Super 14 versions. But to suggest that the laws may not "grow the game" and are therefore undesirable fails to analyze the intention and effect of the laws in practice.

The real question we should be asking, is not whether these laws will grow the game, but whether they make it more entertaining, simpler, and shift the outcome into the hands of the players instead of the referee.

There was tremendous opposition to the ELVs here in NZ when they were being experimented with across the ditch in Australia, and I am glad that some of the ELVs that didn't make it into the Super14 were discarded. However, fear of change and poor results for one's own team aren't good reasons to dismiss the ELVs.

To suggest that the only effect of the new laws is an extra four minutes of ball in play is a seriously flawed analysis. I do think a place like the Silver Fern is one of the best forums for intelligent discussion about the actual real-world effects of the changes, let's just not dumb down the argument- that's what the media do for us.