Any props available to answer a question by a non-player? I'm curious about how heads are used in the scrum.
Background to the question, and the question: Didn't have rugby in the States where I grew up, but we did have (real) wrestling, and that was my sport. (And I'm a lightweight, so I'd never pack a scrum in the first place.) One thing we'd do in a tie-up situation is use the forehead like a lever. If you have the right bind/grip, and your forehead in the right space between the opponent's jaw/neck/collarbone (with your neck and back straight), you can pretty much just drag a person flat to the ground while you stay in a strong position. If you've ever watched Randy Couture fight mma, he did something similar when he'd pin someone against the fence, but almost in the opposite way -- he'd use it to hold his opponent up so he could strike, instead of grabbing and using it to pull his opponent down (and Couture was an Olympic-level wrestler).
So since #ScrumStraightJoe and the extra analyses available on what props are doing, I've been wondering about this every time I see a scrum. It almost seems like a LHP wouldn't need to angle out if he was using or could use his head in that way, because it causes a kind of chain reaction that takes the opponent right out of position -- i.e. you could achieve similar ends through legal means.
Is that kind of thing taught or coached? Is it even possible in a scrum? I'll never know first-hand, so I'm asking you experts.
