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The England national rugby team heading for Australia has been announced and it consists of some of the heavyweights of the game. With just days left for the FIFA World Cup 2010, hundreds of English fans are keeping their fingers crossed that just like their football team, their rugby counterparts too perform wonderfully. The team will start their campaign on the land of the Kangaroos at Perth on Tuesday, the 8th of June. Fans of both sides are pretty enthusiastic about the tie and will support their respective team to the fullest.

Chris Robshaw, the veteran flanker from Harlequin Football Club has been made the captain of the England rugby team. His experience and skill in the game will surely be a big factor and lift the confidence and spirit of the team when they enter the field against the Australian Barbarians. The 2003 Rugby World Cup champions will hope to add to their list of successful performances on Australian soil. They are slated to play 2 tests and also 3 mid week matches.

According to coach Martin Johnson, this tour will offer a great platform for debutants and new players to get a feel of international matches and prove their worth before the Rugby World Cup kicks off next year. He was also confident about the good performance of the English team in the tour and hoped that the veterans will motivate youngsters to give their best in the field.

The England team will have a blend of both youngsters and veterans. Four players are expected to make their debut on Tuesday’s match. They include Dave Attwood from Gloucester,  Dan Ward-Smith from Wasps,  Hendre Fourie from Leeds and also Leicester’s Geoff Parlin. The exuberance and skill of these players will play a major role and inject that young blood into the squad.

The veterans too will have their own bit to play in the team. Ugo Monye and Lee Mears have scores of experience of playing for the national side and this will surely be a positive factor for the team. With the uncertainly over the playing of Jonny Wilkinson due to injury, Charlie Hodgson will be a perfect choice to fill up the position. The team’s depth will also be added by the inclusion of David Wilson and  David Flatman in the front row. It will be backed well by Olly Barkley in the inside center position.

Technically speaking, the English side has the balance to topple any strong opponent. It now needs to seen where the promises are put into effect in the field.

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New Rules for Spectators or The Game?

To give the game a new face lift, to avoid boring lop-sided matches the IRB is all set to experiment with a new set of rules. The rules aim to make the game faster and keep all the rugby enthusiasts glued to the game. Actually, the IRB officials have been working on developing these rules ever since the Rugby World Cup in France in 2007. Most of the matches were rather too mundane and not many teams risked running into the deep and thus conceding crucial points to the opposition.

In order to deliver “knock out rugby” to the fans and to force players to run with the ball there are a set of three new rules implemented by the IRB. Following is a list…

1. Kicking directly out of play will result in a lineout from where you kicked it, regardless of whether the player was inside the 22 metre line, and regardless of whether that team played the ball back inside it or not. This excludes full penalties, in which case the current law still applies.

Fans will definitely like the idea, as it would make the game more aggressive. But the success of this initiative will depend on how the breakdown is policed because the players might not want to run the ball into contact from behind their own line.

2. The ball will no longer need to be fed into the middle of the scrum and ‘crooked’ feeds is also allowed.

Though scrums are a trademark of the game but they consume a lot of time because the scrums have to be reset again and again. With this rule the game can be restarted more quickly. But the game will lose the scrums as there will be no chance of the opposition winning the ball.

3. There will be a limit to how many times each player can kick the ball during a game – this will be set at 3 each for backs and 1 each for forwards to begin with, but could be adjusted easily at a later date.

This rule will in turn lead to the appointment of a ‘Kicking Official’ who will keep count of the number of kicks for each player. According to the IRB this rule will reduce unnecessary kicking to a large extent.

Hope these rules will alleviate the game to the next level and remove yawning crowds from the rugby field!

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Ever since the final team list for RBS 6 Nations tournament was announced there were speculations in the French press regarding the fitness of the Les Blues rugby star Lionel Beauxis. But the star decided to end all speculations with his stellar performance against the resilient Scottish side. Owing largely to the lion-hearted display by Beauxis France was able to defeat Scotland 22-13. He kicked five penalties and added 11 more points to make the difference between the two teams. Though Thom Evans made the initial tries but Beauxis got into the act and sailed away France out of Scottish reach. The performance raised many questions over the team selection procedure as Beauxis had to sit by the sidelines in France vs Ireland match.

Lionel Beauxis takes a penalty kick in his return match

Beauxis, the man behind the France’s victory over Scotland earlier this year, had a pelvic injury he suffered in the Top 14 win over Toulon. This injury meant that he had to undergo extensive rehabilitation and most of the season. But now that he is back and creating ripples in the International Rugby scene all his fans are having gala time!