View Full Version : numbered shirts
We are about to play in a competition where the rules state
'All teams must wear numbered shirts in accordance with IRB requirements to ensure the correct identification of all players and replacements during a match.'
I have searched through the IRB site and can't find the relevant rules - can anyone help?
All our players have their own jerseys with their names on and a variety of numbers - on any match day we inevitabley have a few duplicate numbers, but no duplicate names
Just get someone to tape numbers on the back, so if you have 2 "9"s then get someone to tape a long stripe after the 9 to make "91"
BigJ, RFU game regulation 19.2 uses such language:
19.2 Numbering The jerseys of Clubs should all be numbered in accordance with any iRB requirements in order to ensure the correct identification of all players and replacements during a match. However, the obvious iRB regulation would be regulation 12 (players' dress), which makes no mention. So perhaps you can comply with RFU Reg 19.2by having no numbers, there beiung no applicable iRB reg? Someone put me right here.
My diagnosis would be someone on the competition committee making (arguably understandible) assumptions without doing his homework. This follows the thick vein of well meaning officiousness that distinguishes rugby in the same way that the scrum and line out do.
Greek letters is the answer.
WRU brought in the requirement to have numbered shirts this season for all levels from Under 8's upwards. Can be quite costly if a club has 9 junior teams! Makes it a lot easier to referee when you have a number to call out!
Bunniksider
08-02-10, 12:02
Who was it that used to play with letters rather than numbers on their shirts? About 10-15 years ago I think. Could have been Quins prior to the GP.
Regulation 15
http://www.irb.com/mm/document/lawsregs/0/regulation15090603_8290.pdf
Lee Lifeson-Peart
08-02-10, 13:02
Who was it that used to play with letters rather than numbers on their shirts? About 10-15 years ago I think. Could have been Quins prior to the GP.
Leicester and Bristol(?) did.
I refereed a game last year with letters (change kit due to clash of colours) and it is odd.
You may remember back in September I abandoned an U16 game where one team had no numbers which made identifying a number of culprits impossible!
Tigers
Hence the "ABC" Club of their front row - Rowntree Cockerill Garforth
SimonSmith
08-02-10, 13:02
Bath also had a problem as they were forced to play with a Number 13 as I remember.
*lights pipe and settle back*
Bunniksider
08-02-10, 13:02
Yes Leicester it was, all comes back to me know. Time for a nap. :)
dave_clark
08-02-10, 13:02
didn't someone also have to re-introduce the number 4 shirt? West Hartlepool maybe?
Lee Lifeson-Peart
08-02-10, 13:02
didn't someone also have to re-introduce the number 4 shirt? West Hartlepool maybe?
Didn't Bath used to play without a no.13 shirt?
dave_clark
08-02-10, 14:02
yep, and there was some club who had to re-introduce the number 4 shirt too...
:p
Quins used squad numbers for a season or two IIRC - somehow seeing a winger with the number 40 shirt on didn't look right.
Regulation 15
http://www.irb.com/mm/document/lawsregs/0/regulation15090603_8290.pdf I think any iRB regulation entitled International matches is unlikely to impinge too heavily on the members of this forum - at least at this stage in their careers. No offence Donal - I do understand that there is a 1:5 chance of any Irish referee distinguishing himself in internationals at some stage in his career.
Leicester and Bristol(?) did. Brizzle did indeed. I can't recall whether the practice extended into 1983 for Mike Rafter's victorious John Player Cup final team against leicester at Twickenham, but I was at uni in Bristol then, and watched several midweek games at The Memorial Ground with Brizzle wearing letters.
In 1939, Wales appeared in lettered jerseys for their game against England. Don't know if this was common practice before then.
I think common sense has to come into play for most of our games.
Can you individually identify each player by his shirt? If you can, then fine.
I was once told, don't worry if one player has no number at all, as long as he is the only one, you know who he is.
I remember A was the FB. Out of pure curiosity and nostalgia can you oblige with the rest please, OB?:love:
stuart3826
08-02-10, 16:02
Regulation 15
http://www.irb.com/mm/document/lawsregs/0/regulation15090603_8290.pdf....is out of date - only refers to two front row players - at that level now there must be 3, numbered 16, 17, 18
I was once told, don't worry if one player has no number at all, as long as he is the only one, you know who he is.
One of the clubs in Northampton occasionally puts out a 5th team.
They all have a 5 on the back of the shirt.
Waterloo vets used to all have a question mark instead of a number.
Camberley Vets have (or used to have) either a "G" or a "&" or a "T"
Reffed them many years ago, and straight from Kick off "G" knocked on- duly called colour and number (or letter), followed by a chorus from half a dozen others of "Oh no I didn't..."
Taught me to look at numbers before hand...
Player numbering was used sporadically between the wars, and there was no agreed system. From 1931 England and France used the modern system, Wales used letters starting with A at fullback, and Scotland never seemed to use the same numbering system twice. Ireland started with 15 at full back, but numbered the pack from the backrow.
In the 1950s all the 5N used sequences of numbers but starting in different places. In 1960 they all agreed to use the modern system.
In club play in England there were no rules, but when the leagues started in 1987 the RFU decided that they should all use the international system. Before then Bristol had used letters starting with A at fullback whereas Leicester had O at full back.
SimonSmith
08-02-10, 22:02
When Scotland played England in the Calcutta cup at Twickenham in 1928 King George V asked a former president of the SFU James Aikman Smith (known as Napoleon) why Scotland were not wearing numbers and was told "This sir is a rugby match not a cattle sale". Numbers did not return to Scotland's jerseys until two years after Smith's death.
By 1950 all the home nations used numbers but England, Scotland and Wales numbered the players starting from the full back (1) and France and Ireland did the revese with the fullback being 15. From 1960 they agreed to use the France/Ireland numbering.
From RugbyFootballHistory.com
ACUSmember
09-02-10, 01:02
In club play in England there were no rules, but when the leagues started in 1987 the RFU decided that they should all use the international system. Before then Bristol had used letters starting with A at fullback whereas Leicester had O at full back.
Was it 1987 that Bristol got rid of their lettering system? I could have sworn somewhere at my parent's house I have a copy of the match report for Harlequins v Bristol towards the end of 1997 (the first rugby match I ever went to - I had decided to support Bristol* for no better reason than my Grandfather lived there, and it was where my father grew up), which has a large colour photo of (I think) Paul Burke wearing "F" on his back. I'm fairly convinced of the season, because it was the first season I supported Bristol, and the first season they were relegated from the top flight, which was 1997/8.
My recollections of the match are that Bristol showed why they were relegation fodder that year by merrily waving through Quins players for three tries in about the first five minutes, which lulled Quins into such a sense of security that they forgot to play for about the next sixty minutes, allowing Bristol to take the lead, before scoring deep in injury time and missing the conversion to tie the scores, leaving Bristol winners by two points!
Next time I'm at my parent's home, I'll have to dig it out and refresh my memory.
*To describe me as an armchair supporter doesn't even begin to cover it, although in fairness I've never lived anywhere near Bristol.
Seem to recall that one of the London Uni's players in shirts with roman numerals on the back. makes it difficult to call out "IIIV role away" but I think within the law?
ACUSmember
09-02-10, 09:02
Seem to recall that one of the London Uni's players in shirts with roman numerals on the back. makes it difficult to call out "IIIV role away" but I think within the law?
You should have booked him for not wearing II!
makes it difficult to call out "IIIV role away"
Shouldn't that be "II volvo absentis" ?
I haven't got a Volvo either.
"Nunc tunc pueri, ignis via" :wow: :nono: :eek: :D
"Nunc tunc pueri, ignis via" :wow: :nono: :eek: :D
What does that mean?
It was the classic example of bad literal translation given by our first year Latin teacher. The words separately mean "now then boys, fire a way".
"Nunc tunc pueri, ignis via" :wow: :nono: :eek: :D
What does that mean? Literally: Now then boys, set the road on fire. Alternatively, OK lads, light the way.
"ignis" is a noun, not a verb.
"ignis" is a noun, not a verb. You say that as though it might help!
Rit Hinners
09-02-10, 18:02
Light as opposed to Ignite.
WOW a Latin hijacking, who would have thought it
SimonSmith
09-02-10, 21:02
epistula abiga est
Now THAT'S a Latin hijack!! (or close to it :) )
Lee Lifeson-Peart
10-02-10, 15:02
Romani iti Domum
SimonSmith
10-02-10, 16:02
Can't believe you set me up for this:
Brian: Third person plural, present indicative. "They go!"
Centurion: But "Romans, go home" is an order, so you must use the...?
Brian: The... imperative!
Centurion: Which is...?
Brian: I!
Centurion: [twisting Brian's ear] How many Romans?
Brian: [yelling] I.. Plural, plural! Ite, ite!
When I used to play (around when I was at university half a life ago!!) I played for a team whose motto was "Floreat qui fallit" .... probably a motto that wouldn't go down too well now...or would it?:chin:
Romani iti Domum Romanum eunt domine
epistula abiga est
Now THAT'S a Latin hijack!! (or close to it :) )
And that from a man whose society motto is "Solus Judis Legis"!
SimonSmith
11-02-10, 00:02
I am NOT responsible for that!!!
SHITE! Now I really know what I'm up against . . . but should I care?:sad:
operor retineo non forensis liberi attero vos
i love google on the rare occaison you are looking up common phrases....this came up on wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illegitimi_non_carborundum
Suave qui peut . . bugger you jack, I'm OK?
Suave qui peut . . bugger you jack, I'm OK?
Neat!
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