Smashed by players twice their size: junior rugby's big problem

Zachary Hullah who was severly concused while playing rugby Supplied 28 OCYOBER 2014

Things were already going badly for the Greytown U13s. Winger Zachary Hullah isn't exactly sure, but he thinks rival Wairarapa club Pioneer had already run in 70 or 80 points shortly into the second half. It's not surprising Zach's memory is a bit hazy, given what happened next.

"I got passed the ball from [a teammate]," Zach recalls. "I went to step inside and try to fend [my opponent] but he smashed me. I saw the ball drop then all I saw was this blackness. I woke up and there was a big ruck in front of me, over me. I was real confused. I thought I was still in the tackle, had just blinked or something. I couldn't move. My back was killing me. I was shaking, like nervous. I was very scared. I thought I might have been paralysed. I didn't want to move it hurt so much."

A doctor who happened to be at the match immobilised Zach and the game was called off. Around 45 minutes later an ambulance arrived. Zach was placed in a neck brace and trucked off to hospital.

There was nothing illegal about the tackle that left a 12-year-old in such a state. Zach's father, the team's coach, agreed with the decision not to award a penalty on the play. So did Zach: "It was a great tackle," he says.

The problem wasn't the intent or technique employed; it was that the tackler who smashed Zach was twice his size.

Player numbers by age groups

Injury rates by age groups

Carol Hullah was distraught. The mother of two older boys as well as Zach, she ran on to the pitch for the first time in over a decade of watching her sons' rugby games. To her, the potential for serious harm from the extreme physical mismatches between the players had been obvious.

"Zachary is pretty big for a 12-year-old, he's pretty tall for a kid his age, he's not a tiny little slight thing," says Carol. "But this kid looked like he could have been 15. He wouldn't have been but that is how big he looked."

About an hour earlier, just 23 kilometres away, Sandra McNab was waiting to watch her son's first game of the season, an under-15 match between rival schools Wairarapa College and Chanel College. Well before the first whistle, McNab was worried. Many of the Chanel players towered over their counterparts. "I was looking out thinking 'what is going on here'?" says McNab. "The opposition were enormous."

'It was total madness'

The physical disparity was clear enough for the referee to declare that there would be no pushing in the scrums. But five minutes into the game a Wairarapa player was crushed by a much heavier opponent. The boy felt tingling in his fingers, which turned out to be the result of a bruised spine. The match was shifted to an adjacent field while the boy waited for an ambulance.

"It was total madness," says McNab. She estimated eight to 10 of the Chanel players were as big or bigger than many of the grown men watching from the sidelines. "It was pretty damn obvious that some of them were not under 15. I was just gobsmacked. It was downright dangerous."

McNab wanted answers. How could such an obviously dangerous situation be allowed? And what did rugby and school officials plan to do to ensure it didn't happen again? She wrote to the Wairarapa Bush and New Zealand Rugby Unions, to schools, college sport officials and principals. The responses she received were deeply unsatisfactory. "A, the rules are inadequate; and B, what rules are there are being broken anyway," she says.

Zachary Hullah: "Now if I see someone that big I am like 'no I don't want to get another concussion'. I'm too scared."

The issue, says former All Black Buck Anderson, who oversees community rugby for New Zealand Rugby, isn't straightforward. Unions in the larger metropolitan centres have enough players to form teams and grades with players closely matched in size and age; smaller provincial unions don't enjoy that luxury.

"It is a numbers game," says Anderson. "The more numbers we have playing the easier it is, for wont of a better term, to cut and dice the playing population to make sure that grades and competitions have appropriate sized players in them."

In Auckland, the country's largest rugby union, the job is fairly straight forward, says GM of community rugby Matt McHardy. Of the 55 teams under-8 teams (the first grade in which tackling is allowed) that competed across the city, 43 played in a division where the maximum weight of players was 31kg. The remaining 12 teams competed in a division where weights were capped at 47kg. Any players who didn't make the weight moved up to under-9 level.

Wairarapa Bush has one grade for eight year-olds, consisting of 14 teams, with weights capped at 50kg. Even then, however, heavier players may be granted a dispensation to play in the grade if a suitable team can't elsewhere be found for them. That means McHardy's 26kg son, had he been growing up in Masterton, might well have found himself playing against boys quite literally twice his size.

"I feel for the smaller unions," says McHardy. "It is not easy for them."

Sadly, the issue isn't all down to logistics. Size can be decisive in rugby, and plenty of unscrupulous parents and coaches appear are willing to tip the scales in favour of their child's team. A Wairarapa parent who asked not to be named said the flouting of rules and the questionable use of dispensated players was rife in the union.

"There is a lot of bitterness around larger kids ruining it for everyone," the parent said. "One particular club is out of control. They regularly play players who are over-age and they regularly play people who are over-weight. And it is bloody dangerous. You see some of these kids and you wince. There has been a whole heap of concussions this year. There is a serious worry that there is going to be a serious injury - and then who is responsible?"

Fobbed off

McNab has been posing the same question. She believes New Zealand Rugby has abdicated its responsibility by deferring to provincial unions, and that unions such as Wairarapa Bush have utterly failed to address the issue. Weight bands at junior levels are so broad they are ineffectual and, in any case, they only apply to children under 12. After that it is open slather. As player enter college grades the issue becomes the relative age of players, with players often granted exemptions to play in age grades for which they are too old.

"[New Zealand Rugby] are not prepared to deal with it," says McNab. "They are still saying provincial unions have to deal with it. Well, they are not dealing with it. The [rules] are farcical." Wairarapa Bush chief executive Tony Hargood insists the union and its volunteer junior committee are doing a good job in difficult circumstances. The union commissioned an independent review of its college rugby policies following McNab's complaint and "safety of the players was paramount when we conducted the review".

McNab feels she has simply been fobbed off. "As much as they continue to say safety is paramount their decision making does not reflect that," she says. "It's all very well to have robust policy but if it is not actually put in place and nobody is making sure it is happening then it is no good to anybody."

Sandra McNab believes New Zealand Rugby has abdicated its responsibility to ensure players are kept out of harm's way. Photo / Lynda Feringa

Wairarapa is far from the only region battling with the issue. Overseeing a geographically vast union with far flung outposts, Northland administrators often have little choice but to lump kids of different sizes in together.

"If you don't look at dispensations you are saying 'if you live in a rural area you can't play rugby'," says Greg Shipton, the union's operations manager. "We also look at it and go you can't exclude the big boys or you are going to get in trouble at the top end of your game. It's a hard one. I don't know if you'll ever get a happy solution."

Just like in the Wairarapa, however, a dispensation system designed to ensure rugby lives up to its goal of being a game for all shapes and sizes is often abused.

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"The sad thing about it is that at the end of the day the kids just want a hotdog and chips, but we have some parents and coaches who live their lives to win," says Shipton.

In Auckland, breaches of size rules are dealt with swiftly. Complaints are directed to the union's standards committee, which deals with transgressing coaches. Union officials are then dispatched to that team's next game to make sure the breach is not repeated. "Those sorts of things pretty quickly get sorted out," says McHardy.

Don't like getting hurt

Things appear to move more sedately in the Wairarapa. McNab is far from satisfied with an official line that suggests people in smaller provinces simply have to put with mismatches.

"I do not believe our kids should be playing under substandard safety standards because we live in a small region," says McNab, who will be raising the issue of the duty of care provided by local schools with their boards of trustees.

McNab's agitating has gained some traction, with the issue on the agenda at a national meeting of provincial rugby union delegates next month. "We are very aware and conscious of the issues that are out there," says Anderson. "We know that a size imbalance might not make for the best experience. And we know that the more numbers we have playing the better the provincial unions can mitigate against it. That is one of the reasons we are trying to encourage as many people as possible to play the game. If we can make it safe for kids them they are far more likely to have an enjoyable experience and continue playing."

And what of those kids? New Zealand Rugby's registration figures show participation is growing among kids aged under 13, however the number of teenagers playing the game continues to drop. Societal influences beyond rugby's control will certainly be a factor, but there is plenty of evidence to suggest some teens quit rugby because they don't like getting hurt.

"I saw the ball drop then all I saw was this blackness." - Zachary Hullah in a neck brace and being taken to hospital.

A New Zealand Rugby survey of teens who dropping out of the game in 2004/5 found part time work was the most common reason, however a significant number also cited injury as a factor. ACC injury statistics obtained by the Herald indicate the injury rate among 15 and 16 year-olds has spiked alarmingly since that survey was completed. In 2005 the number of new ACC claims as a percentage of players was 30.8.

In 2013 the figure was 47.58 - an increase of over 50 per cent. The injury rate among ten to 14 year olds, by comparison, remained relative static, ranging from 11.71 to 14.02.

McNab is in no doubt the size mismatches are a factor in both the injury rate and the drop off in teenaged players.

"The issue compounds," she says. "Every year we lose more players because of the size mismatch and every year it is a little less safe for the ones that stay in the game. Eventually you have to bite the bullet and say, 'This can't go on, we have to do something about it.'"

Carol Hullah agrees. After serving a four-match stand down for concussion, her son Zach returned to the rugby pitch. His confidence was shaken, and the same giant opponents awaited him.

"Some of them have tattoos all the way down their legs - like real tattoos," he says. "I used to be one of the best tacklers in our team - not trying to show off or anything - but I would go in and try to tackle my best. But now if I see someone that big I am like 'no I don't want to get another concussion'. I'm too scared to [tackle]."

By the end of the season his confidence was returning. In the competition final Zach scored two tries as his Greytown team again faced Pioneer.

The big kid who smashed him was still in the Pioneer team, playing alongside a 10-year-old. "That was a bit stupid because he could get smashed by all of us," says Zach.

Junior rugby weight bands

Wairarapa Bush
Under 8: 50kg
Under 9: 55kg
Under 10: 60kg
Under 11: 65kg
Under 12+: No restrictions

Auckland
Under 8: 31kg* / 47kg
Under 9: 35kg* / 53kg
Under 10: 39kg* / 59kg
Under 11: 43kg* / 65kg
Under 12: 49kg* / 74kg
Under 13: 55kg* / 83kg