Coming soon to a school and club near you? Tag plus.

Several south-eastern counties are currently being treated as a testing ground for new forms of mini- and junior rugby for U13s, the main feature of which is to delay the introduction of full contact rugby until possibly as late as  U13 (School Year 7 or 8), whereas at present contact rugby in the minis starts around U8s or U9s.

Though these initiatives will be very unpopular with coaches and boys already playing mini rugby, in practice it will probably not make any real difference to girls rugby. Though many girls do play rugby from the age of 6 or 7, their small numbers compared with the boys - and the lack of advice to coaches or any official initiatives to keep them playing - means that many (most?) drop out by the time they are 9 or 10. Indeed, it may help girls (and, come to that, boys) take the game up in Years 6 or 7 as, at the moment, any 10- or 11-year olds wanting to join a mini-rugby team have a huge mountain to climb.

As part of this England players Amy Turner and Rachael Burford (in their role as RFU's Community Rugby Coaches) have been delivering a transition game called Tag+ for year groups 7 and 8 across Kent, Surrey and Sussex.  It has the same rules as Tag but includes uncontested lineouts and scrums to restart the game. Apparently (according to the RFU) schools have seen the girls, parents and staff discover that rugby is an "engaging, inclusive and enjoyable game".

Strange. The implication of that is that contact rugby, as it is currently played in Herts, is not an "engaging, inclusive and enjoyable game", which is rather an odd thing for a governing body to say...