So there appears to be quite a few americans on this forums with a smattering of the british!

Just wondered peoples opinions about the differences and preferences between Rugby and American Football.

To me, you can't really compare the size or stamina of the players. Both sports have to have different team members with different attributes. Yes, americans footballers have to wear pads but I presume that is because of the off the ball tackling. There's alot more breakdowns in AF (fed up of typing it all out) so i'm presuming the players have a lot of burst speed and high strength. Where as in Rugby it doesn't break down as much (depending on the tactics) so the players need to have the strength but also the stamina for the drawn out phrases.

Also like I said in american football (I don't have the greatest knowledge of the game i'll admit) it seems that there are the massive blockers and then the skinnier runner, where as in rugby more and more lately all players seem to be getting bigger and also faster to deal with the very big teams such as the All Blacks.


Any thoughts?

Originally Posted by Sgt Diz

So there appears to be quite a few americans on this forums with a smattering of the british!

Just wondered peoples opinions about the differences and preferences between Rugby and American Football.

To me, you can't really compare the size or stamina of the players. Both sports have to have different team members with different attributes. Yes, americans footballers have to wear pads but I presume that is because of the off the ball tackling. There's alot more breakdowns in AF (fed up of typing it all out) so i'm presuming the players have a lot of burst speed and high strength. Where as in Rugby it doesn't break down as much (depending on the tactics) so the players need to have the strength but also the stamina for the drawn out phrases.

Also like I said in american football (I don't have the greatest knowledge of the game i'll admit) it seems that there are the massive blockers and then the skinnier runner, where as in rugby more and more lately all players seem to be getting bigger and also faster to deal with the very big teams such as the All Blacks.


Any thoughts?

I really think it comes down to the type of game you like, Rugby is a high speed, high endurance game but it is rather one dimensional, American Football on the other hand is a much slower paced tactical game primarily because of the forward pass.

I enjoy both games but for totally different reasons and don't consider any one sport better than the other in that respect.

In terms of size the All Black and Australian forward packs are not that big in comparison to others we prefer mobility and stamina to size but we tend to have a larger back line than most, basically the game plan is to be faster to the break downs and faster to exploit opposition mistakes thus forcing much larger forward packs to run a lot and consequently we run them off their feet and that negates their size usually by late in the first half.

South Africa and France are a more traditional heavy forward pack and lighter back line but they have an incredibly fast back line where as the "Home" nations tend to be the more traditional 10 man rugby style of play.

On the whole both sports played well are great to watch and much like yourself I can't for the life of me fathom the rules to American Football.

A bunch of sporting American wives told me once in Washington Dc - "We love Rugby - it gives the little guys the chance to play".

I enjoy watching the NFL, replays that is where they cut out about hour and a half of crap between the plays.

I think the biggest different is that an American football player has one job and that is his sole focus, a guys job is to kick the ball and then he goes off the field? 3 different teams in 1?

Whereas rugby players have the responsibility of filling every role on the field if they need to. In todays game the backs are expected to get into the ruck when the ball goes out wide, and then the forwards fill in the spots in the backline and have the ball skills to atleast pass it left or right.

Yeah, + the skills to stay alive.