The next installment in the series is a fairly lengthy clip - about 8 minutes - but, if you're interested in this debate, it's very much worth the watch.

It's American football vs. rugby from a scientific perspective, and measures tackles from both a rugby player and a padded American football player.

The conclusion they come to is certainly interesting, but we're not sure that we entirely agree. Watch it through (it's not until the final few seconds that they actually make the comparison, so skip to the end if you're really impatient), and then think about this:

Would you prefer less poundage in the tackle, and a broken rib? Or more poundage, but dispersed so that your ribs stay intact?

And, would you prefer 20 broken ribs from 20 tackles during a game? Or about 10 tackles during a game, where none of your ribs break?

You'll have to watch the whole clip to know what we mean by this.

And, before we leave you to it, there's one more point:

For the experiment, they use an American football player and a rugby player who are both from America. What would change if the experiment was staged with an American football player from New Zealand, and a New Zealand rugby player?

Just a thought.

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One of the hot topics in the Attic lately has been the American Football vs. Rugby debate.

It was our original intention to enter the debate, but we've talked about it (and researched it, too) at length - and we're not sure we're in a position to do that.

See, we've never played American Football. So can we comment on how 'tough' or 'rough' it is? Or isn't?

We don't think so.

We've read so much on this debate, and there are many, many passionate arguments out there. But, to be honest, most of them seem to be born from ignorance. Rugby players who think their sport is the 'toughest' because the players don't wear pads. American Football supporters who think their sport is 'tougher' because they make tackles without arms.

We think it's all a bit naive...one of these sports probably is 'tougher', 'rougher', or whatever you want to call it - but which one that is, we don't know.

What we do know is that too many people know too little about the opposing sport before starting these debates. So, we feel the best thing for us to do is to educate, rather than join the debate.

We can't tell you a thing about American Football. We watch the Super Bowl, sure, but we don't know enough about it. What we know is rugby - inside out, and upside down. So, for all you American Football supporters out there, we're going to feature (over the next week or so) a series of videos.

These videos are intended to educate. They're to show people who don't know the sport that there are tackles without arms, there are broken bones, there are tackles above the shoulders, and there is a lot (a lot) of blood.

It's damn fast, and it's damn rough.

Enjoy the series, sports fans. We hope you learn something!