Why the drop punt should be torpedoed

The lost art in rugby that if reintroduced will send rival teams into a spin.

Michael Lynagh mastered the art of the spiral kick

It is in the nature of old men to reminisce, to hark back to a mythical golden past in which everything they did was better than today. David Clark turns 81 this month which definitely puts him in the “old man” category. But what if, in at least one respect, he is right. What if they did do it better back then?

Clark played five-eighth or fullback for GPS club in Brisbane from 1957 to 1976, allegedly without ever getting his hair ruffled, and 27 times for Queensland. He was called up to the Australian side in 1962 and 1963 but, sadly, never played a Test, though he surely was worthy of that honour.

It was, however, as a coach that he truly excelled. He was Queensland’s first director of coaching from 1976 – the year Queensland rugby really took off with its memorable 42-4 defeat of NSW – and Bob Templeton made great use of him as a backs coach.

From there he was made head rugby coach at the Australian Institute of Sport and, in time, became Canada’s first professional coach, ultimately taking them to 11th on the world rankings and a 24-7 win over Tonga at the 2003 World Cup. He had been controversially sacked as Canada coach in 2001 but – and you’ve gotta love this – the Canadian players went on strike until he was reinstated. So, not only a well-respected coach but a well-loved one …

Clark shakes his head at a lot of things happening in the modern game, not least the fact that the forwards have made the backs virtually expendable. Set a scrum, win a penalty, kick for the corner, roll over the tryline from the driving maul. Backs not needed.

But that is a matter for another day. Clark’s primary concern is the disappearance from the game of the spiral punt, and specifically the spiral bomb. When he argues they did it better in his day, he is completely right because, frankly, they don’t do spiral punts anymore. Or, if they do, it was surely an accident.

That 42-4 victory over NSW …. that was built on the back of the spiral Garryowen. Towards the end of that match, Queensland captain Mark Loane had only to point his index finger skywards and Paul McLean would send up a towering bomb, swirling in the direction of Tahs’ fullback Laurie Monaghan. He would take them bravely, the ball and the entire Queensland pack simultaneously, and over the next decade the tactic developed into a weapon of terror for the Maroons. Ultimately, with the introduction of the law that said players in the air could not be touched, the tactic dropped out of use.

As a general weapon though, the spiral punt persisted. Clark taught it to a whole generation of Queensland players – McLean, Roger Gould, Michael Lynagh, Matt Pini, Elton Flatley – and saw each of them develop into an outstanding tactical kicker. Matthew Burke must have disguised himself in a maroon jersey at times, because he too mastered the art.

Yet Clark reserves the title “Prince of the Punt” exclusively for McLean for his mastery of it, particularly when kicking for touch either in general play or from a penalty. He regularly used to peel off great chunks of territory. Much as Reece Hodge does for the Wallabies today, though with a consistency that Hodge would envy.

There were those who said that the spiral punt was useful only when a right-footed kicker was kicking for the left-hand touchline or a left-footer for the right-hand line but Clark quickly dismissed them. “No understanding of the mechanics of kicking a torpedo,” he would say. “A left-footer can kick it in such a way towards a left-hand touch that it will go from left to right. And by changing his technique he can make it go from right to left at the end of its travel, thereby gaining maximum distance.”

Why the spiral punt also passed into history, no-one is quite certain. The drop punt took its place, presumably because of the influence of the AFL, though that hardly accounts for its global adoption. “The drop punt is pretty easy to control off your boot,” Wallabies coach Dave Rennie told The Australian. “But it’s designed to catch. That’s why it’s used in the AFL.”

Precisely. Where one player is kicking to a teammate. But – with the obvious exception of the drop punt across from the five-eighth to the winger – kicks in rugby tend to be caught by the opposition. So why make them easier to catch?

McLean’s concern about the drop punt is that it is a kick with back spin. “You never get the run on a drop punt that you would get on a torpedo,” he said. “If you are kicking for distance, why would you use it?”

Legendary rugby league coach Jack Gibson used to advise his kickers to “aim for the seagulls” because if the seagulls were there, the humans weren’t. But whether the seagulls are there or not, Rennie’s job of turning the Wallabies into a more savvy tactical kicking team is surely blunted by the drop punt which, frankly, doesn’t fly.

”Spiral kicking – it cuts through the air quicker and if you are trying to kick for a corner you can find grass easier with a spiral than a drop punt,” said Rennie. “But it is certainly harder.

“I look at someone like (Scottish fullback) Stuart Hogg, who I coached at Glasgow, and he had a massive boot. He could punt it 80m on a spiral. But he would “time” it only one kick out of four and there were some real duffs in among them. So it is a real skill. Back when we played everyone spiralled, none of us drop punted. Still, it is a skill that guys are practising and it has a place in our game.”

Certainly in the case of McLean and Lynagh, the success rate was not one-out-of four but close on 100 per cent. Still, they had been executing torpedo kicks since they first picked up a ball.

Roger Gould’s fear is that there are so few people left with a knowledge of how to make the torpedo fly. “Where are you going to find your teachers? You’ve got to instil the right technique when the kicker is about six,” said Gould. “It’s no use waiting until they’re 20. It’s too late then.”

True.

It may well be a job for an 81-year-old.