Movement Demands of Rugby Sevens in Men and Women: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis

Ball, S, Halaki, M, and Orr, R. Movement demands of rugby sevens in men and women: A systematic review and meta-analysis. J Strength Cond Res 33(12): 3475–3490, 2019—Global positioning systems (GPS) provide comprehensive information of player movement demands in rugby 7's. Although studies have investigated the use of GPS within many field-based team sports, the application of GPS within rugby 7's remains unclear. The aim of this review was to evaluate the movement demands and conduct a meta-analysis on comparable GPS measures to assess player movement in rugby 7's. A systematic search of electronic databases Medline, SPORTDiscus, Cinahl, Web of Science, Scopus, and Embase was performed. The search strategy combined terms covering: global positioning systems AND rugby union. Studies were included if they contained rugby sevens' players monitored by GPS. Meta-analyses were conducted to provide a pooled mean and confidence intervals (CIs) on outcomes for data extracted from at least 3 studies. A total of 24 publications were eligible for review and included 661 (447 male and 214 female) rugby 7's players. Meta-analysis indicated that male players cover greater relative distance (male: 108.5 m·min−1, 95% CI [104.9–112.1] m·min−1, female: 100.3 m·min−1, 95% CI [96.0–104.7] m·min−1), distance at>12.6 km·h−1 (male: 449.3 m, 95% CI [427.0–471.5] m, female: 339.5 m, 95% CI [291.1–387.9] m) and>18.0 km·h−1 (male: 190.3 m, 95% CI [180.7–199.9] m, female:...
Source: Journal of Strength and Conditioning Research - Category: Sports Medicine Tags: Brief Review Source Type: research