Fast becoming disillusioned with the game after 40+years as a player, ref and spectator. Apart from the aerial ping pong and rugby league defences, one of the killers for me is the ruck and the way the scrum half stands there organising his pods with the ball at his feet. When sorted he bends down picks the ball up and passes to one of them/or kicks. Then it is repeated, repeated, repeated.............Had the misfortune to watch Italy ve Ireland when the Italian scrum half stood there for long periods before playing the ball. The commentators 'commented' on this and one said that there was nothing that could be done. Well yes there is. The scrum half can only pick the ball up when it is out and as such the ball must be out while he is doing his organising. Therefore the defending side side should be allowed to come around the side and play the ball as well. A period of refs calling the ball out will soon speed up the game and cut out this boring aspect.

I don't think so, the ball is still in the ruck, most of the time, until the scrum half plays it.

Very often refs tell us something like "one hand on is in, two hands on and its out."

Pedantic, I know but:

16.4 OTHER RUCK OFFENCES

(b) Players must not handle the ball in a ruck except after a tackle if they are on their feet and have their hands on the ball before the ruck is formed.
Sanction: Penalty kick

If the scrum half stands there until he decides when he is ready to pick the ball up, he is either guilty of handling the ball in a ruck or the ball is already out and available to all.

I know that in reality hands help the ball back in many rucks but application of the law would at least make scrum halves think twice about hanging around at the base of the ruck.

I can't say I read 16.4 ( like that, I think you might find it means a player in the ruck may not handle the ball.

I've never seen an onside player, from outside the ruck, penalised for retrieving the ball. It would kill the game if they were.

Forget about the tosh of exact interpretation of the rules.
Ex Ref is absolutely right - for the sake of the game and the enjoyment of spectators such a simple confirmation by the ref "ball out" would galvanise quicker play.
It's quite often only marginal whether the ball is in or out of the ruck anyway so what's the difference?

I'm not sure it's the ref's job to direct play like that.

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Stuart

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i agree with the intention here to speed the game up but for theref to declare "ball out" when actually it clearly isn't will only confuse things further

far better would be a rule along the lines that a player cannot unduely prevent the game from continuing by deliberating refusing to play the ball when it is available - ref would be able to give the old instruction of "use it or lose it"

The Americans have "delay of game" as a penalty offense if memory serves.

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Stuart

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that sounds like the thing i meant TCM, aka 'the meerkat' penalty and sanction being tap and go to opposition