"According to the commemorative stone on the Doctor's Wall at Rugby School, when William Webb Ellis picked up the ball and ran with it in 1823, he showed "fine disregard for the rules" of the game as it was then played.

182 years on the same spirit prevails at the home of the game, as his successors at Rugby Lions showed equal contempt for the laws.

When Webb Ellis played, however, there were no referees, players were gentlemen, and cheats were "cads of the most unscrupulous kidney".

By contrast, the referee on Saturday was in no mood to tolerate experimentation with the laws, and penalised the home side 20 times for a full range of indiscretions, most of which were beyond dispute.

The visitors could have some passing sympathy for the mounting frustration of the home team, as we have endured those days where a combination of carelessness, poor concentration and sheer self indulgence, have seen honest endeavour undone.

However, Saturday's contrast was significant. In the first half we conceded a single penalty, with three more in the second period.

Long spells of sustained defence were operated entirely within the laws, depriving Rugby of two of the modern game's most potent scoring weapons: the kick at goal and the driven lineout.

It is informative that the home team had only one penalty goal attempt and a single penalty kick to touch.

There is no coincidence that in the current sequence of three consecutive wins, on no occasion have more than nine penalties been conceded.

In none of those games have we conceded a try to a driven maul. The people who think this is coincidence, or that conceding penalties is inevitable and unavoidable, are the sort of people who make bookmakers rich.

The modern game provides teams with between 12 and 15 possessions from each of the scrum and lineout, and, on average, about half a dozen from the kick off.

In conceding 20 penalties, Rugby made this by far our greatest source of primary possession.

Dan Stephens was successful with five out of seven attempts at goal, defying his pre-match practice form which had the ball collectors scurrying to all parts of the postcode.

This, and the fact that not a single touch kick was missed, kept the opponents under constant pressure.

The significance of this victory should not be underestimated, on a day when a series of unlikely results suggested the effect of what had been, for most clubs, a month's lay-off.

Rugby's advantage of having played the previous week was startlingly apparent for the first quarter of the game, in which they scored all their points.

After that, I felt that our performance was nothing short of outstanding in both attack and defence, against a side not short of players, and coaches, with first-class experience.

With the number of southern hemisphere accents in evidence contrasting sharply with the nasal drone of the Midlands natives, it is not difficult to see how Rugby attracted a points penalty from the league for fielding too many overseas players.

The recently imported Australian Rugby League professional defence coach was left with plenty of food for thought.

With confidence in the defence, and team discipline coming to match the undisputed attacking capacity, Saturday's performance against New Brighton will be important in seeking to demonstrate that this is a culture change, not a freak performance. We are, of course, unbeaten in 2005.