According to Danish law, parents of newborns must pick their baby’s first name off a government-approved list. Invented and non-listed monikers can’t legally be typed on a birth registration, without obtaining approval. My wife isn’t Danish, but she was nonetheless born in Roskilde. Fortunately for her, she’s on the approved list. God only knows what otherwise might’ve befallen her.

In Ol’ Blighty it’s a punishable offence under section 32 of the Salmon Act to handle any salmon, trout or eel in “suspicious circumstances”.

Credit: Simon Letch

Now, you can make deliciously compelling, straightforward and easy arguments to amend each of these laws, to avoid lunacy if nothing else. But sometimes, fiddling with things for the sake of fiddling with things has consequences.

Section 8, subsection 1 of the International Rugby League’s Laws of the Game relevantly states that: “[w]hen points have been scored, the team against which the points have been scored shall kick off to restart the game …” Simple; no room for manufactured chaos.

But apparently, what’s proposed by the National Rugby League for season 2026 is a sort of upending of this rule. Leaving aside the confounding oddity that binds rugby league in that a national body can thumb its nose at the sporting rules of the international federation, the NRL now wants to impose a different restart method.

Instead of the team conceding points being required to kick off to restart play, that team would be given a choice on whether to do that, or instead receive the ball by a kick-off from the scoring team.

Kick-offs are the latest focus of a potential NRL rule change.Credit: Getty Images

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