Every rugby player knows they need to be agile, but very few train for it or even know why they need agility for rugby.

Being able to quickly move your feet and hips to a space on the pitch where the opposition were not expecting you to be is a very useful skill.

Agility in Rugby is needed in a large variety of situations from attacking, to defending and even having the ability to avoid injury.  Agility in handling skills is a slightly different element but still highly important.  Also agility has to do with being able to react quickly to what happens on the pitch, whether that be to a quick lineout throw or getting back ten metres after the referee has penalised you.

All you have to do is watch a professional game on the TV today to see players quickly adjusting to all the demands of the game and utilising all the skills necessary to do that..

Agility is most noticeable in attack.  The very best are so adept they can completely wrong foot you so that you don’t even lay a hand on them, but this is not the norm for most players and is especially difficult in the game today where defences fan out across the field.

What good agility in attack will allow you to do, however, is get to the outside shoulder of the oncoming tackler.  By being agile you’ll be able to shift your body so that you are in control of the situation not the defender. Hopefully with enough agility you’ll be able to get beyond the tackler and beyond the gain line.

Nobody likes to be munched and lots of players and fans like to see big hits levelling and driving players into the dirt.  That’s where agility comes in for defence, it’s not only the ability to quickly move into position for a defensive line but also to adjust to the oncoming attacker and get yourself into a position to do the most damage or at the least get a hand on them, slowing them down and allowing your fellow players to come in and help you out.

Agility is not just quick dancing feet, but also the ability to change direction at near top speed and maintain that speed.  How many times have you seen some of the best players cut in and out with very little of their speed being lost.

Ok, so in the majority of cases you wouldn’t find a prop with those sorts of skills, but the game is changing so quickly that it probably won’t be long!!

When looking at the different elements of what actually makes up agility we find that it includes foot speed, breaking speed, acceleration speed, change of direction speed, control of the centre of gravity and other elements such as technique and timing….ever seen someone try to be too clever and end up tripping over their own feet.

In order to be agile you not only have to learn certain techniques and drills but in a lot of cases you must develop some of the basic characteristics needed for rugby that are covered in other sections of this site, such as Strength, Power, Core Stability & Core Strength.

Learning foot speed can be done in a number of different ways but the two most common and easiest to administer are cone drills and ladder drills.

Foot drills can be broken down into 3 phases of learning:

1. Foundation Movement Acquisition
2. Skill Amplitude Acquisition
3. Game Specific Acquisition

So when performing foot work drills you need to start at phase 1, which means starting a slow speed and learning the general pattern of the skill.  If you try and jump in at phases 3 you’re doomed to fail. See Muscle Memory for more info.

Once you have the basics learnt you can then start to increase the speed and which will take you into phase 2.  Finally when you have mastered these two you will have entered phase 3 and be ready to use your new found skill in a match situation.

Footwork Example Drills

Below is one of the most basic ladder drills you can perform – It’s called the ‘Ickey Shuffle’, named after a NFL players touch down celebration dance.

In this agility drill example, you’ll see a few variations using the same cone set up.