Johnny Thomas (rugby) Johnny Thomas (rugby) John Thomas ( – 25 September 1954), also known by the nicknames of "Johnny", and "Johny", was a Welsh rugby union, and professional rugby league footballer who played in the 1900s, 1910s and 1920s. He played representative level rugby union (RU) for Glamorgan and Monmouthshire, and at club level for Maesteg RFC and Cardiff RFC, as a full-back or scrum-half, i.e. number 15, or 9, and representative level rugby league (RL) for Great Britain, Wales, Glamorgan and Lancashire, and at club level for Wigan, as a or , i.e. number 6 (number 10 in a 15-player team),
Scrum (rugby union) scrum, and so when it emerged at the back of the scrum the scrum-half would often find the opposition flankers and scrum-half arriving with it. The new offside line became the hindmost foot of the scrum. Only the opposition scrum-half could move forward of that point, and all flankers had to stay bound unless they remained behind the hindmost foot of the scrum. Another rule change introduced allowed the number 8 or the rear-most bound forward to detach from a scrum with the ball, previously it could only be retrieved by the scrum-half. Around 1996, the All Blacks came up