Just been reading an article in the Hull Daily Mail where it's been reported that the upcoming Hull derby will have over 30 players unavailable for both teams. We are all aware of the injury issues we've been experiencing at Cas this year, and there are other teams with similar problems.
So my question is - What's changed? What's causing these (often serious) injuries?
I certainly don't remember a season where so many injuries have affected teams - particularly season-ending ones, such as ACL and bicep tears.
I can only think it's all due to the sheer speed of the current game. We now have 6-again resets, which on paper sounded great, but sometimes the interpretation of the rules combined with the frequency just seem to sucker punch again and again. We also have the urgency to keep the ball in play as much as possible with the various shot and scrum timers.
Finally, the short-turnaround mad double-header weekends don't help matters, either. At the end of the season, we should be gaining momentum toward the Grand Final playoffs, and instead we're faced with teams with half their first-choice players missing.
Are we asking too much of our players? Should we go back to scrums and penalties for PTB infringements?