The experimental law variations represent the most radical shift in thinking since William Webb Ellis picked up the ball and ran with it. And while the North gave the world a game that continues to challenge and entertain, the South, who have held the cup named after the English schoolboy on five of the six occasions it has been contested, want to mould it into something resembling rugby league.

Not every Antipodean is behind the Australia-led initiative that is designed to make the game “more entertaining”. Eddie Jones, the former Wallabies coach and now the director of rugby at Saracens, is not convinced that the new laws serve the best interests of the game. “In Australia you are competing against Aussie Rules where the ball never stops, football where the ball never stops and rugby league where the ball never stops,” Jones said. “In any of those games you can go 20 minutes and see absolute continuous action and that’s what people like in Australia. But if you go to a rugby game you will see two minutes and then a stoppage.

“The great thing about rugby and what makes it different from other sports is the equilibrium between contest and continuity. We have serious contest for the ball but if you are good enough then you get continuity with the ball and that’s the thing that you have to maintain to keep our game unique.”

It has been a frustrating time for players in the southern hemisphere. The ELVs were introduced in the Super 14 in February but the internationals in June were played under the old laws before the ELVs kicked in again for the Tri-Nations, Air New Zealand and Currie Cups.

Nick Evans, the fly half who has left the All Blacks for Harlequins, has come to terms with the changes and now takes a laid-back approach to how the laws will affect the northern hemisphere game. “I think that the way English clubs are trying to play the game now — a more expansive game — that the new laws will actually suit them,” he said. “They have been umming and ahhing about them here and they ummed and ahhed about them in New Zealand. There were fears that they would ruin the game but I don’t think they have affected the rugby. The old heads that like a forward-orientated game will still get that once in a while and the purists will still enjoy it.”

Derick Hougaard, the Bulls fly half who has come from South Africa to Leicester, is sceptical that the new laws will suit the game in the North. “I don’t understand why they wanted to change the game everybody loves,” he said. “Rugby is a set-phase game and now all the set phases are a shambles. They have tried to make it a more entertaining game with more running but what happened in the Super 14 was that we did a lot more kicking — almost 20 to 30 per cent more. There were a lot less line breaks. Only time will really tell how it goes in the Premiership but I think some of the games here, especially in the wet, will become like a ping-pong battle.”