Contact is coached in person, on a pitch, by someone watching you. This page is here to make that coaching land faster, not to replace it. Rugby AI does not score tackles and never will. We cannot see legality, head contact, or force from a phone, so we do not guess at them. Do not practise contact alone or with a friend who has not been coached.
Guides / Contact / Tracking a moving target
Contact
Guide
Tracking a moving target
Keeping your eyes and your feet on something that will not hold still. The target here is a rolling ball, because a ball can be practised with alone and a person cannot.
What good looks like
- Your eyes stay on the target the whole time, not on the ground in front of you
- Your feet keep shuffling, so you are never flat footed when it changes direction
- You stay square to the target rather than turning your hips away from it
- You end the rep closer to the target than you started, and still balanced
The drill
- Stand on a slope, or against a wall, with ten metres of clear grass in front of you.
- Roll a rugby ball away from you hard enough that it bounces unpredictably.
- Move with it. Stay square, keep short steps, and keep your eyes on the ball.
- Do not dive on it and do not slide. Arrive next to it under control and pick it up.
- Reset and repeat eight times.
Space
Ten metres of flat or gently sloped grass and one rugby ball. No partner.
Why the target is a ball
A rugby ball bounces sideways, which is the closest a solo player can get to something that changes direction without warning.
It is also the honest limit of this drill. A ball does not read you, it does not step off its left foot, and it will not beat you. Tracking a person is done in a coached session with somebody watching, and this drill is the preparation for that rather than a substitute for it.
Make it harder / make it easier
Harder. Start with your back to the field, turn on the bounce, and find the ball late.
Easier. Roll the ball straight and slowly along the ground, and walk with it while keeping your feet moving.
Contact is taught, not scored.
Solo and contactless. Contact itself belongs in coached training.
