With a World Rugby meeting scheduled for November in London, Brenden Nel argues that Dave Rennie is positioning himself as the figurehead of a concerted push to simplify the scrum and dial back the effectiveness of the maul — two areas where South Africa and France currently hold significant structural advantages. Nel traces the momentum building behind this assault: Rennie's public criticism of Bok scrummaging, recent Irish media commentary pointing to a surge in URC maul tries (32 across 24 matches this season), and the lingering frustration of nations who felt outmanoeuvred at the Shape of the Game conference. The piece frames this as ideological as much as technical — an All Blacks-led attempt to nudge rugby toward a faster, less physically dominant game that suits their style, with Rennie essentially arguing that laws shaped under the previous regime need revisiting now that he's in the chair. Nel's broader warning is that constant law tinkering corrodes the game's identity, and that the November meeting could represent another front in a longer war over what rugby is supposed to be.