Help Shape Rugby Management
Rugby Management is being developed around the decisions that make managing a rugby team challenging, unpredictable and rewarding.
I’d like rugby supporters, players, coaches, referees and gamers to help shape what it becomes.
What should you be able to control? What information should you have during a match? How should selection, tactics, injuries, form and discipline affect your decisions?
If you understand rugby, play management games, or simply have ideas about what would make this one better, I’d like to hear from you.
Building a Rugby Management Game: Making It Feel Like Rugby
Development Diary · August 2026
I have been working for some time on an idea that sounds simple enough: a rugby management game in which you manage the team rather than control the players. You select your squad. You choose the team. You decide how you want them to play. You deal with form, fitness, injuries and substitutions. Then, when the whistle blows, the players have to play the match themselves.
That last part has proved rather more difficult than it sounds.
The idea
Most rugby games put you in direct control of the players. This one is different. I want the player to be the manager or head coach of a national team. You might begin with one of the developing rugby nations rather than immediately taking charge of England, Wales, Ireland, France or New Zealand. You inherit a pool of players, assess them, run trials and eventually select your squad. From there, your decisions matter.
Who is your first-choice scrum-half? Do you select a powerful centre or one with better handling skills? Is an experienced player still worth his place when a younger player is producing better performances? Do you change your tactics because of the opposition? During the match you can watch, make substitutions and react to what is happening, but you cannot suddenly take control of the fly-half and make him throw a perfect pass. He has to make that decision himself. That is where things become complicated.
Twenty-nine players with minds of their own
A rugby pitch contains 30 players, but only one has the ball. The other 29 still have to decide where to go. That is one of the biggest challenges I have encountered.
A winger should normally stay wide, but not always. A full-back needs to position himself behind the defensive line, but must recognise when to join an attack. The scrum-half needs to follow play closely enough to reach the next breakdown without simply chasing the ball everywhere. The fly-half should offer himself as first receiver. Centres need to provide attacking options. Forwards have to support the ball carrier without all arriving in exactly the same place. And everybody has to react when possession changes.
Early versions could obey the basic rules of rugby while looking nothing like rugby. Players stood in strange places. A scrum-half wandered away from the breakdown. Wingers came infield when they should have stayed wide. Players receiving passes stopped and waited for the ball instead of running onto it. Occasionally the ball seemed to have ideas of its own.
Technically, a match was taking place. Visually, you wouldn't have mistaken it for the Six Nations.
Teaching players their jobs
I have gradually started giving different positions much clearer responsibilities. The number 9 now behaves much more like a scrum-half. The number 10 looks for the position from which he can control the next phase. The full-back has his own defensive responsibilities. The two wings understand that one belongs predominantly on the left and the other on the right.
The forwards are beginning to form more realistic supporting groups rather than spreading themselves across positions normally occupied by backs. Passing has changed too. One seemingly small improvement was getting a player to run onto a pass. Previously, the receiving player could wait for the ball and then start moving. It worked mathematically, but looked completely wrong. Now I am trying to create movement in which the pass goes to where the receiver is going rather than simply where he is. That one change makes a surprising difference.
Rugby needs to flow
This is probably the biggest challenge at present. Real rugby isn't a sequence of isolated events. A tackle becomes a ruck. The scrum-half arrives. The ball moves. The defence reorganises. A forward carries. Another breakdown forms. Then perhaps the ball goes wide and suddenly there is space. All of that has to happen without somebody secretly arranging every movement in advance. I am getting closer. There are now passages where I watch the simulation and recognise what the players are trying to do. Attacks have more shape. Tries look better. Players support one another more naturally. Then something peculiar happens and reminds me that this is still very much in development.
Lineouts remain troublesome. Players sometimes make poor positional decisions. The ball can occasionally behave strangely. Some passages still lack the speed and continuity that make rugby compelling to watch. Every improvement also has the potential to break something that was already working. Fix the scrum-half and you might alter the spacing around the breakdown. Improve passing and suddenly the defensive positioning needs attention. Make attacking players more ambitious and you may discover that they are breaking through far too easily. It is a constant balancing act.
The manager's problem
Eventually, all this work on the match engine has to serve a much bigger game. I don't want the result of a match to feel predetermined. If you select the wrong players, use unsuitable tactics or leave exhausted players on the pitch, there should be consequences. Equally, a weaker team playing well should occasionally beat a stronger one. Players will have individual abilities, form and fitness. They will collect caps and build careers. Performances will affect future selection. Injuries will force changes.
Your assistant coach may even point out afterwards that the player you left on the bench would probably have been a better choice. The aim is that, over several seasons, you become attached to these fictional players. You remember the veteran prop who earned his fiftieth cap. You take a chance on a young fly-half. Someone who was originally a reserve becomes indispensable.
And perhaps success with a smaller rugby nation eventually attracts the attention of one of the major countries.
Where are we now?
The game isn't finished. There are still problems to solve, and there will undoubtedly be problems I haven't discovered yet. But something important has changed during recent development. I can now watch parts of a simulated match and think: That looks like rugby. Not all the time. Not yet. But often enough to suggest that the original idea might work. And that makes the next stage rather interesting.