Kronfeld: Rule changes are ruining our game

All Black great Josh Kronfeld has launched a stinging attack on rugby's latest set of rule changes, saying the IRB's experimental law variations should be ditched immediately.

The 54-test veteran said the much-touted ELVs were robbing the 15-man code of many of its traditional strengths and characteristics.

He said he was becoming so disillusioned with the direction the sport was heading in, that his interview with Yahoo!Xtra was the first time he had talked extensively about rugby in the first three months of 2008.

Kronfeld said he saw little merit in the law variations being trialled in the Super 14, adding they threatened to do far more damage than good to rugby.

"I think it is shit, I think it is absolute crap personally," Kronfeld said of the ELVs-controlled Super 14 action to date.

"They are just making the game too much like league.

"I am all up for a fast game, but a fast game is all about the players getting in there and playing it. But I think they (the rule makers) are slowly degrading rugby by taking lots of things that have been a massive part of what is rugby out of the game.

"Forward play is basically being devalued. That to me just sucks.

"I love to be a forward but every year they seem to take something out of the game. Rucking doesn'pt exist anymore and mauling they are slowly getting rid of.

"People aren't watching it and it is because they can't keep up with everything going on all the time. Slowly it is becoming more like league, you might as well just join the two together now.

"It is a real concern, we need to be worried about it. It is not fantastic to watch."

Kronfeld, on the coaching staff of Dunedin's famous Varsity club, said he would neither like to play or coach under the ELVs.

Supporters of the variations claim they are aimed at making rugby rules simpler for players, referees and fans to understand.

But Kronfeld said he believed the ELVs would eventually create a stereo-typical player.

"They are basically making a picture for one type of player across the board, so everybody is the same size, build and speed," he said.

"If they carry on too much, they will kill it for grass-roots.

"There used to be the wee solid kid who would be the bonus for your team as a front-rower. He wasn't very fast, but he was strong, could prop up and hit rucks and do that sort of stuff.

"But he is slowly being bred out of rugby.

"The forwards have slowly crept to all being the same size. You have massive props who are tall and lanky now, almost the same size as your locks.

"Your locks are almost the same size as your loose forwards.

"And slowly it is happening across the backs. All your backs are 100kg plus. And it is all because of the rule changes."

Kronfeld said of the rule-makers: "They just keep changing shit all the time and it is slowly killing the game.

"These people who make decisions, I don't know if they are all rugby players. And if they are, they are a long way out of it."

Kronfeld said he was frustrated by the never-ending rule changes being driven by the IRB, adding there was nothing wrong with the rules in place when he played the last of his 54 tests in the black jersey in 2000.

Kronfeld believed greater communication, not rule changes, was the key to ensuring rugby remained an entertainment spectacle.

"It is better off if you get referees talking to senior players, learning how to police it and how to go forward," he said.

"Then you will have a better result. We have to be really careful. I would hate to see forwards not playing the type of game that can be played."