JUDGEMENT DAY

It was as inevitable as it was sad that World Rugby would one day be subjected to legal action in relation to head injury management.

The game has periods in its history which don't present well under scrutiny.

Back in the amateur days when replacements could only be made because of injury, there was a reluctance for anyone to come off the field.

Players would stay on through the most extreme injuries. That was the culture of the day – hard men proving just how hard they were, while there was also an element of players not wanting to give the next guy an opportunity in the jersey.

As former All Blacks captain Buck Shelford says in The Captain's Run: “Today's era is quite different because you are playing with 23 players,” he says. “In my day you weren't. You were playing the whole game and you didn't give it away for anything.

“You would play through anything. If we broke fingers, you would stay on the field. Tape the bastards up and get on with it. Six or seven stitches…you play on. Concussion… captains wouldn't let you go off the field. Jock [captain Hobbes] wouldn't let me off in Nantes when I was concussed. Today Jock would not have done that and nor would I. It was just how leadership was back then.”

We can only