THE Welsh Rugby Union are to use GPS technology in the Principality Premiership to see if the experimental law trial has had the desired effect in terms of an expansive game.

This season the top flight of club rugby has tinkered with some laws, most notably changing to points system with tries increased to six points and penalties downgraded to two.

Anecdotally there seemed to be a growth in the amount of driving lineouts but statistics have shown that while the number of lineouts has gone up from 29.9 per cent from 25.4, the number of drives has stayed fairly constant.

The average number of tries per match is 6.4 – up 0.9 from last season – while the number of penalties has gone up from 23.6 to 25.1 with the amount of yellow cards dished out staying at a similar level.

Teams are now kicking penalties to touch 65 per cent of the time compared to 30 per cent last season while the number of penalties kicked for goal has gone down to 12 per cent from 44 per cent.

However, the aim of the experiment is to try and increase the intensity of the Premiership and close the gap of the ball-in-play time to the professional game.

With that in mind, WRU elite coach development manager Geraint John is to work with Premiership bosses to try and encourage an expansive approach.

He said: "The analysis is not conclusive with regards to any clear advantages or disadvantage of the law trials at this time.

"While there are more tries, there are more lineouts so the impact on creating a wider, more attacking game is not clear at this stage.

"In my view, it's more about working closely with the coaches to ensure we are playing the type of game that best serves our purposes in developing players for the game and to that end we are looking to trial GPS technology to gauge intensity and running speed during Premiership matches.

"We have the advantage over the next couple of years that the Premiership will be ring-fenced so we can perhaps look at how best we can improve the product for the benefit of the players, coaches and supporters too without the pressure of relegation."

John has invited Premiership coaches to a series of workshops and will hold an evening next month where they can observe the Wales Under-20s management and players as they prepare for their Six Nations clash with France.

"I'm certainly buoyed by the enthusiasm of the Premiership coaches and clubs to better themselves and as a result, their players and I look forward to collaborating more closely with them as we move forward," said John.

He continued: "It's a critical pathway for players to develop into regional and international players. Therefore it's important we do as much as we can to develop the quality and brand of rugby played at this level and support the coaches in delivering that."