Rugby Sevens World Cup

[Cal Alamein]

Dunno much about rugby, but I am truly digging NBC coverage of this world cup in San Francisco.

Wide open field, 15 minute matches, I love it!

For you true rugby players and fans, is the seven on seven a bit of a gimmick or does it have the same respect as rugby union or league?

[Pietro Paolo Virdis]

.

[Ray de Galles]

For me, it’s an enjoyable summer knockabout and an excellent part of the Commonwealth (and now Olympic) games but far below the importance of the 15 a side game. For others (especially in some non-traditional rugby nations) it is or is becoming the favoured code.

We’ve discussed it a little in the main rugby thread, though I haven’t seen any coverage because of a busy sporting and work weekend. Probably a good thing given Wales’s performance.

[ursus arctos]

I also find Sevens use of “World Cup” in the winter sports sense (a series of competitions held at a wide variety of venues, with an overall winner crowned at the end of a long season) to be unnecessarily confusing and annoying when the other rugby codes (and all football codes) use it in a very different sense.

[Cal Alamein]

It was the USA win v Wales that hooked me in.

NZ looked studly. England did well to frustrate South Africa.

Can’t think of an equivalent variation of the game for any of our major team sports.

[Ray de Galles]

I also find Sevens use of “World Cup” in the winter sports sense (a series of competitions held at a wide variety of venues, with an overall winner crowned at the end of a long season) to be unnecessarily confusing and annoying when the other rugby codes (and all football codes) use it in a very different sense.

This is an actual World Cup though, a one off tournament standing alone from the World Sevens Series tour.

[ursus arctos]

Ah, I hadn’t realised that. Objection withdrawn.

Cal, the closest North American comparison is professional three on theee basketball, which is becoming a thing.

[Southport Zeb]

It was the USA win v Wales that hooked me in.

NZ looked studly. England did well to frustrate South Africa.

Can’t think of an equivalent variation of the game for any of our major team sports.

3 v 3 basketball will be an Olympic sport in Tokyo

[ursus arctos]

It will be interesting to see who the US sends to that, and if they get smoked by a bunch of Euro sharpshooters.

[Hot Pepsi]

It was the USA win v Wales that hooked me in.

NZ looked studly. England did well to frustrate South Africa.

Can’t think of an equivalent variation of the game for any of our major team sports.

Arena football, I suppose, and/or indoor soccer. Both never seems to really succeed but never seems to be quite dead either.

[Janik]

Sevens is not actually separate from the league/union split. IIRC it was originally a league idea, and there still is a version of it that exists playing with lightly adapted league rules (and run by leagues governing bodies). But the one that has become internationally succesful and is played at the Olympics etc. is union 7s and is governed by the IRB.

[Janik]

Oh and on the US sports front with cut-down numbers, how about Lacrosse? The main professional league of that seems to be indoor and played on Ice Rinks with the ice covered. That must mean it has rather smaller teams than the traditional game.

[Kevin S]

Yes, the smaller-sides version of RL is Nines. So ironically the smaller-sided code has the larger-sided smaller-sides variant, if you catch my drift. And, as a result, Nines pretty much looks like full RL anyway.

[Cal Alamein]

Arena football, I suppose, and/or indoor soccer. Both never seems to really succeed but never seems to be quite dead either.

I was more thinking internationally, something with a major tournament/World Cup sort of thing

[Kevin S]

The Cricket world cup is based on what is technically an abbreviated form of the game.

[Kevin S]

Anyway, yes, I found the Sevens to be one of the best things about Rio.

[ursus arctos]

Box/Indoor Lacrosse is an interesting example because it has been played since the 30s and is considerably more popular in Canada (and among Native Americans) than the the outdoor version. In that way, the split is more like that between union and League, though it is much, much more common for players to play both “codes”.

Outdoor teams have ten players and a goalie; Indoor teams five and a goalie.

[Hot Pepsi]

Box/Indoor Lacrosse is an interesting example because it has been played since the 30s and is considerably more popular in Canada (and among Native Americans) than the the outdoor version. In that way, the split is more like that between union and League, though it is much, much more common for players to play both “codes”.

Outdoor teams have ten players and a goalie; Indoor teams five and a goalie.

That’s exactly right.

There’s also a bit of a class difference. As I understand it, box lacrosse in Canada is played and watched by roughly the same people who watch hockey. Lacrosse in the US is, despite significant growth in the last 20 years and efforts by its allies commercial interests, still dominated by private schools and people from places like Darien or the Main Line outside of Philadelphia.*

But unlike in rugby, there’s not much rivalry or nastiness between the versions. Box lacrosse would probably be a lot more popular in the US if we had more indoor facilities for it and perhaps outdoor lacrosse would be bigger in Canada if the snow melted off the fields a bit earlier.

* Unfortunately, lacrosse started to make an effort to democratize itself just as there’s been a huge influx of money into youth and school sports in general pushing it the other direction. Soccer has the same problem - everyone who cares about the growth of the game and the quality of our professional league despises pay to play, but there’s a lot of money, parental anxiety, and vested interests keeping it that way.

[tee rex]

The old park looks very nice on TV, but the crowds looked light (for the women's final yesterday).

[tee rex]

Wonderful extra-time try by Scotland there. Chucking it around on their own line, then one guy runs 100m.

[ursus arctos]

The old park looks very nice on TV, but the crowds looked light (for the women's final yesterday).

It opened in 2000 . . .

One of the most successful of that generation of "retroparks"

[Hot Pepsi]

New Zealand is too good at this.

[Rogin the Armchair fan]

Sevens is great entertainment. Fiji's win in Rio was one of the highlights of the games for me.

Back in the days of amateur club rugby in England, the Middlesex sevens was one of the most prized trophies in the game. Used to attract something like 256 entries from clubs all over the UK and even international sides, and used to end up with finals like London Welsh v The Army.

[Flynnie]

The old park looks very nice on TV, but the crowds looked light (for the women's final yesterday).

The three days each featured 8-9 hours of rugby, and there's a lot of places to watch the game besides your seat. It certainly would fill up for the big men's games.

World Rugby claims 102,000 attended over the 3 days, which is actually not a sellout. The ballpark has 40,800 seats.

[ad hoc]

I like 7s. It appeals to me way way more than regular RU does. I recognise for hardcore union fans this marks me out as the kind of dilettante that they would look straight down their noses at (in the way that I would look at someone who preferred T20 to test cricket). But the game is fast, easier to understand, and involves much more of the flowing backs play that us non-fans prefer at the expense of all the other rucking mauling scrumming stuff