Tag rugby: An oval ball with a social circle

At the risk of sounding like a knock-off Ross O’Carroll Kelly, this writer once beat the socks off the cream of Leinster rugby. On an actual rugby pitch.

It was not a solo effort, obviously, and I didn’t score the decisive try, but my tag rugby team did beat a tag rugby team containing at least three Leinster players including Gordon D’Arcy and Leo Cullen in the semi-final of some class of blitz played in Old Belvedere a long, long time ago.

While D’Arcy and Cullen and the rest probably won’t remember it, my ragtag team – wherever they are – are unlikely to forget that moment of shining brilliance. It was dulled only by our near-total collapse in the actual final. Good times.

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Tag rugby was introduced to Ireland 15 years ago and is perhaps the only team sport in which men and women compete together on a level playing field. This, coupled with the fact that it takes about 15 seconds to learn the basic rules, goes some way to explaining its popularity in Ireland and for many 20-, 30-, 40- and even 50-somethings it has replaced the monotony of the gym or the loneliness of the long-distance run on bright summer evenings – and, increasingly on some dark, dreary winter evenings too.

The man who introduced it to Ireland is Simon Bewley. He came across the game in 2000 when he was in Australia, and brought it home. “At its most simple level it goes back to when we were kids playing tag in the school yard, just running around trying to catch each other,” he says now. “Everyone loved that game when we were kids and we all still love it now. We have just added some rules to it.”

In its first season in Ireland, St Mary’s rugby club in Dublin hosted the competition and 32 teams from companies around Dublin were involved. The following summer, there were 124 teams. This year, there are about 650 teams registered to play in venues in all four provinces, and that is just in the summer leagues. There are also leagues in the autumn, winter and spring.

When the game was starting out, Bewley was employed by the IRFU to develop the game but, following in the good old tradition of so many Irish movements, there was a schism and the IRFU went one way and the Irish Tag Rugby Association (ITRA), and Bewley, went the other.

The social element is strong and the games tend to be extremely good-natured, although a competitive edge remains and it is not unusual to see a slight woman delivering a rollicking to a burly, red-faced man if he fails to spot her in perfect try-scoring position. That’s because it is always important for the men who may have grown up playing traditional rugby to keep an eye on the women in their teams because if they score they get three points, while men get just a single point.

It is this inclusive incentive which makes the game appealing to many women as a team – even a team made up of Lions – will struggle to win without everyone on the team being involved.

It has been made more inclusive by the introduction of more female-friendly rules at the social level. Among them are stipulations that a woman must kick off when the game is restarted, and a bonus box behind the try-line which is worth an additional point if a woman touches down inside it.

The rugby clubs in Ireland have been hit by professionalism and the increasing focus on provincial as opposed to club rugby. Tag rugby had proved to be a great revenue boost and has been successful in winning a whole new audience for the game at all levels.

Tag rugby nights in Dublin, for instance, regularly attract bigger crowds than an All-Ireland league night and they also attract people who have never played rugby. “In some ways we are the biggest sponsors of club rugby in Ireland. On tag evenings the bars are open in the clubs, the barbecues are on and the place is rocking.”

“This is a proper sport now and attracts very high-level athletes,” Bewley says. “But it is also a fun sport for all levels and while it can be competitive it can also be about having fun. A lot of people who play have met partners through the game and gone on to get married and have kids.”

You just need to have a look at social media on Irish international match days to see the virtually all-pervasive popularity of a sport that was once the preserve of a predominantly male, well-heeled set in south Co Dublin – and some more working-class areas farther south.

“Rugby has never been more popular,” says Bewley. “But the contact sport is regarded by many as being dangerous. Tag ticks all the boxes in that respect. People may not want to play the contact game but tag allows everyone to get involved.”

The ITRA is also looking to get more younger people involved in the game and is organising tournaments aimed at pre-teens and would like to get into more primary schools. “It is a multiskilled game that is non-contact. It is not hard to see why parents love it,” points out Bewley.

Limerick’s Old Crescent Rugby Club will host the Pig ’n’ Porter Tag festival in the middle of July. It is the biggest tournament of its type in the world. There are also beach tournaments in places such as Sandymount. And the World Cup will be held in Australia in December. When it comes to tag, the Aussies are top dog but the five Irish teams travelling there will still hope to do well in the over-30s, the seniors, in which women must be 30 and men 33. There are also over-40 and over-50 categories but there will be no Irish representation at those levels.

Maybe I should get the (quite literally) old team of Lion tamers back together. If only we had the knees for it.

See tagrugby.ie; pignporter.com