The curious case of the disappearing penalty goal: Why rugby is no longer a 3-point game

The Age

23-05-2025

Statistics show in this year's Super Rugby Pacific, on average, there has been only 2.1 penalty goal attempts per game. That's down significantly from the 2011 season, when an average of 7.6 penalty goal attempts were made in each game of Super Rugby.
(Detailed stats weren't kept before that but a snapshot analysis of three rounds in Super 12's first season in 1996 shows a similar tally, with approximately 8.2 per attempts per game).
Incredibly, after 13 rounds of the 2025 season, the Queensland Reds had not only not kicked a single penalty goal all season, they haven't even attempted one.
The Waratahs have only taken five shots in 12 games, and most teams are on a similar wavelength. The Chiefs are the most 'prolific', with 22 shots attempted this season. That's 1.8 a game.
Where once rugby league fans mocked union for all the boring shots at goal, in recent years Super Rugby has had similar penalty goal tallies as NRL games.
The reason for the disappearance of the penalty goal is simple … and complex.
Instead of kicking for a goal when in range (most of the opposition half), teams are now mostly opting to kick to the corner for a lineout, hunting a seven-point try instead of a likely three.
That, in general, will mean setting up a rolling maul near the tryline, and in the past decade, a significant majority of the tries for many teams have come through the tactic. Hookers, not wingers, have been winning the end-of-season 'top tryscorer' awards.
The rolling maul is a highly contentious part of rugby. Some argue the ploy is legalised obstruction, and it can be almost impossible to stop legally by a defending team.
If illegal methods are used to stop the rolling maul, the defending team can still concede a penalty try - and then lose a player to the sin bin as well. It's a lose-lose scenario - or win-win, depending on which coaching box you sit.
'I think bonus points in club or provincial competitions are what teams are chasing. There are some teams that haven't taken a shot at penalty goal all year, so I think that's what it comes down to,' Waratahs coach Dan McKellar said.
'They'll back their A-zone attack, their maul, and look to take seven points instead of three, depending on the conditions, depending on the momentum.
'We've taken points at times this year, we've also backed our A-zone attack. The big thing is when you've got momentum in the current game, you want to maintain it and keep it, you don't want to lose it.
'So how do you keep that momentum? Is it through taking the points or is it through going to the corner and backing your A-zone game? That's up to each team.'
Maul tries started becoming the weapon of choice in Super Rugby around a decade ago, when teams like the Brumbies turned to their pack to score a majority of their tries. Tail-gunners like David Pocock and Folau Faingaa often scored multiples.
Others soon caught on, and the average attempts at penalty goal have declined every year since.
World Rugby has attempted to address concerns about the maul during the past 10 years, ordering referees to crack down on things like lifters becoming blockers in front of the jumper; unbound ball carriers shimmying backwards; the maul breaking off into a new channel, and players joining in front of the ball carrier.
They are all still refereed very inconsistently, though, meaning the maul remains the wild west of rugby. And for players and coaches, maul tries are highly bankable as an option.
Super Rugby Pacific included a law trial this year forcing teams to play the ball after the maul stops once (not twice, as per the law) but the competition is also in a major a drive to eliminate dead time. So cutting penalty goal attempts isn't exactly seen as an all bad thing.
But it's not just the rolling maul that makes it more profitable to chase seven points over three.
If a maul is stopped, it is also now proving so tough to successfully defend your line, against a barrage of pick-and-drives and short charges, that teams inevitably infringe there, too. Long advantages are played, so if a team doesn't score, they can just re-load with another kick to the corner.
'The way the laws have panned out now, the advantage inside the 22 is given until basically you score. I look at it now … and in commentary, we talk about what are they going to do here, but you can almost guarantee they won't go for goal,' Burke, who is a Stan Sport commentator, said.
Another factor in declining a penalty goal is the territory trade off. You can bank three points, but you then concede territory and receive a kick-off back near your own line.
So spending as much time in the 'A-zone' - roughly speaking the opponent's quarter - and taking maximum points is now the name of the game. Game-clock pressure is the new scoreboard pressure.
'Generally speaking, across the board in the Super Rugby Pacific competition, the type of pressure that can be applied in the A-zone from 10-15 metres in, it is very hard to defend and there is possibility of yellow cards in there too,' Reds coach Les Kiss said. 'That has been a major driver in why teams are starting to do it (not kick goals) more. You just have to get more time up there, that's the challenge.'
The Reds have a French data scientist, Dr Dimitri Perrin, on secondment to their staff this season, and using his expertise in the application of AI and machine learning in sport, have been studying the best approaches to scoring points and winning games.
Spending more time and building pressure in the opposition's A-zone is one of the primary goals, so in that light, it's easy to see why the cost-effectiveness of taking three points and swiftly exiting is looked at in a different light.
Consider this: the Reds have the competition's second-highest strike-rate when it comes to scoring tries per visit to the opposing quarter, at 39 per cent (behind the incredible 50 per cent of the Crusaders).
But Queensland are only equal-seventh in terms of total visits to the opposing quarter. So the choice to kick into the quarter as much as possible - where you get seven points 40 per cent of the time - is weighed against an 80 per cent chance shot at three points, but with the surrender of territory.
Players in the heat of the battle are left to make the call on-field, and decisions are often unpicked with hindsight. Kiss and the Reds have come under scrutiny for ignoring kickable points that could have made a difference in losses, and to their ladder position.
'We do look at the data, though data is a reflective thing,' Kiss said. 'In the moment the players still have to have a sense and back their feel. For example, if the game is 25 minutes old and we have had zero time in that A-zone, what's the decision?'
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For the most part, Test rugby remains an arena that values penalty goals. Rolling the dice to chase bonus points isn't as much of a consideration.
The recent Six Nations showed things are changing though, with fewer penalty goals than most years.
'When the Lions series rolls around, you'll have to take your points,' Burke said.