In almost any ball game related to team sports, playing positions are specialized. Therefore it is essential that coaches must put their players in positions appropriate to their abilities. The purpose of this study was to investigate cognitive structures of rugby football positions.They were analysed by multidimensional scaling (INDSCAL: Individual Differences Scaling).The members of the WASEDA university rugby football club (N=107) and the veteran coaches (N=17) served as subjects. The results of INDSCAL analysis (2-dimensional solution) were interpreted as follows: Dimension 1: tactical dicision making, Dimbnsion 2: tolerance for contact play. The 15 rugby football positions were divided into 4 clusters by weights of INDSCAL subject space, applying hierarchical cluster analysis. Dimension 1 was especially important to the scrum half,left side centre, full back and standoff. Dimension 2 was of special importance to the left side prop and right side prop. Both dimensions were found to be equally important to the other positions. These clusters were discussed from the coaching point of view, and it was indicated that positions should not be fixed for all beginners in the early coaching stage.
