learn and understand the basic rules of Rugby Union and feel like I know what's going on when I'm watching a match

Came accross this site quite randomly, and quite like the whole principle of the thing. I have just started seeing a guy who enjoy watching rugby, and like to be able to watch it with him, and understand what is going on so I dont get bored. We’ll se how it goes!

...of this year’s 6 Nations Cup.
Ireland beat Italy, but could have done better (wake up, lads!), Wales, who won last year’s Grand Slam (=they won every match in the competition) got creamed by England, and Scotland gloriously beat France in their opening match.
I was so into the Ireland game that I slept through the second half of Saturday’s England-Wales match, but Sotland-France was awesome yesterday.
I also made a few loud exclamations about fouls I identified, and I wasn’t too far off, even called a knock-on before my bf.
So I am chuffed and can announce that I’ve DONE THIS.

Today’s lesson, the Maul was easy enough to get. After looking for funny pictures illustrating the maul, here’s the best I could find.
Don’t get me wrong, I really take this goal seriously!
Only 4 1/2 days til the 6 Nations Cup!!! Woohoo!

Pic taken from http://web.mit.edu/wrugby/images/maul3.jpg

The hooker normally throws in the line-out. So for the Irish team, that’l be Shane Byrne.
The line-out is another awesome sight in rugby union (say the BBC).
I have seen a lot of line-outs over the last years, so the general rules were pretty easy for me to understand and hopefully memorize. The new thing I didn’t know before was, that none of the jumpers are allowed to touch the ball with the back of their arms (to knock it somewhere unexpected by the opposing team).

Only two more weeks until the RBS Six Nations Cup kicks off!

Here’s what the BBC website has got to say about an obstruction.
The extensive offside rules are something else, though.

In rugby union, you can only tackle a player in possession of the ball.
Sometimes, a player will deliberately get in the way of an opponent without the ball because they think the attacker has a good chance of scoring a try.
But if the referee sees this, the defender will be in trouble.
A penalty will be awarded to the opposition.
The defender could also find themselves sitting in the sin-bin for 10 minutes after being shown a yellow card.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/sport2/hi/rugby_union/rules_and_equipment/4204726.stm

My 5th 6 Nations cup is coming up, meaning that I’ve been with my Irish BF since 2001, and I’ll be watching the cup matches for the 5fth time.
Being born and raised in Germany, living in the Netherlands now, I have never been in the vicinity of this exciting game, and thus never learned the rules. I can remember asking my mother about tennis rules when Boris Becker won his first Wimbledon and stuff, but my poor love interest has to explain EVERY year again, what is happening now. It’s like: “but why did he whistle again?!”, “And what’s happening now, why a scrummage and not a line-out…”.

I was happy to see the all the rule categories on the BBC website http://news.bbc.co.uk/sportacademy/hi/sa/rugby_union/rules/default.stm, especially the “Rucking and Mauling” sounded interesting, but then when clicking on any of the links, the page with the explanation didn’t load properly, so I gotta find wisdom elsewhere.
So I went here: http://www.cee.hw.ac.uk/Multimedia/V%20Nations%20Cup/frame.html

I know so much that before Italy were added to the Nations, there were only England, Ireland, Scotland, France and Wales competing.
Now I see their tournament’s history page is down, too. Maybe someone high-tackled the server? Referee!!!!