Formation Dancing Is A Numbers Game

WHAT'S in a formation? I ask because, perusing the New Zealand Herald this morning, I found the All Blacks' team to play the South Africans at the weekend, listed in number order – i.e. 1 to 15, then onwards from 16 to 23 on the bench. My own lower regional league club also lists the weekly XV in this order, and why not? Meanwhile, the more common formation one sees is: backs listed 15 to 9; forwards listed 1 to 8; replacements listed 16 to 23.

If the All Blacks list 1-15, why doesn't everyone else

You turn up at a game, you buy a programme, there you generally find the team listings are 15 to 9, then 8 to 1, followed by the replacements in 16 t0 23. There is no standard format. Mind you when I first began going to Murrayfield, the full-back wore 1, the three-quarter line wore 2,3,4 and 5, with the half-backs wearing 6 and 7. It was even more confusing with the pack. As far as I can remember, the number eight did indeed wear 8, the wing forwards 9 and 10, the locks 11 and 12, and the front row 13,14 and 15. However, some other countries would number their pack from the front row: 8, 9 and 10, to the back row. It was confusing. I cannot remember when the change to the now near universal – loose-head wearing 1, going through to the full-back wearing 15 came in, but, it did clarify things.

Of course, even after the numbering system for 1 to 15 was standardised, you still got the odd deviation – Bath never had a 13, so their full-back wore 16. Today, the Ayr XV comes out wearing some strange numbers -20, 22, 26 and 28 can turn-up, but, Team Manager Dougie Stanley tells me this is down to some players having strange body shapes which do not suit regulation numbers.

Ayr team manager Dougie Stanley has some odd numbers to deal with 

Mind you, common sense should maybe dictate, since almost every team now lines-up with their pack in 3-4-1 formation, perhaps the two wing forwards should be wearing 4 and 7, with the locks wearing 5 and 6. And another thing, at the professional end of the game, every team has a spare front row on the bench. Why is it then, that the replacement hooker wears 16, the two back-up props 17 and 18? Surely common sense should further dictate, the spare loose-head wears 16, the second hooker 17 and the back-up tight-head 18.

However, it has taken us nearly 150-years to get to this stage. And, numbering hasn't been mandatory for that long. We all know the great tale of James Aikman-Smith, the great dictator of Scottish rugby, when asked by HM King George V, why the Scottish players in the Calcutta Cup match of 1928 were not numbered, while their English opponents were, Aikman-Smith supposedly replied: “Because sir, this is a rugby international, not a cattle market.” Bang went the knighthood there and then. Scotland did not wear numbers regularly until two years after “Napoleon” Aikman-Smith died.

Let us not forget either, until recently, Bristol and Leicester didn't number their players, they were identified by letters. The legendary Leicester front row of Graham Rowntree, current Edinburgh coach Richard Cockerill and Darren Garforth were the Tigers' front-row on 166 occasions, and were known, because of their shirt letters as: “the ABC” club. Rowntree was an A, Cockerill a B and Garforth a C – choose for yourself what each letter stood for!! Bristol, just to be different perhaps, lettered their shirts with the full-back wearing A, through to the number eight wearing O.

Richard Cockerill - a right B in his playing days

I suppose, now, with the numbering system more-or-less universal, the fact the All Blacks have started listing their team announcements in number order, will mean all the rest will fall into line.

Let us not, however, take this piece to extremes and go into tour numbers – whereby a player in a touring party is given a squad number, which also goes onto his match-day kit. That might be a step too far, although, it used to be common.

I still remember, on my first Scotland tour as a journalist, sitting at the front of the bus, with the players at the back, when they had to number off, so we knew everyone important was on-board. Anyone who ever thought there was a standard Scottish accent would soon have learned different as the numbers were reeled-off in accents varying from Edinburgh Public School, through Borders mill town, via Galloway-Irish, up to middle-class Glasgow and on into Fife and the Doric: “One, twa, fower, seeven, etc”.

Of course, from a rugby journalist's perspective, numbers only work if they are correct. In Monday's papers I saw at least one player wrongly identified, because the photographer at the game was unfamiliar with the clubs he was covering and didn't know that while the match programme had listed Smith at 4 and Jones at 5 in one team, they were actually wearing the other numbers. So, Smith got the caption credit for what was actually Jones's try.

How long though, I wonder, will it be before the PRO14 clubs go down the route of the major football teams and instead of the plain, simple World Rugby imposed system of 1-15 that we have today is set-free for the greater financial rewards of squad numbers, to help boost the price they can charge for replica jersies It works in football, where the youngster buying his Manchester United, Real Madrid or Barcelona replica top can, for a suitably-steep extra payment have 'Pogba', 'Ronaldo' or 'Messi' stencilled onto the back.

Siua Halanukonuko - worth a bomb to his club in replica shirt stencilling

If Tongan tight-head Siua Halanukonuka becomes a fans' cult hero at Scotstoun, then Warriors' coffers will be enriched by kids having his name stencilled onto the back of the shirts - it's all about money these days.