What does "eighthman" mean?

One of the forwards at the rear of a scrum formation who controls the ball at the back of the scrum and links to the back line.

What is a synonym for "eighthman"?

Common synonyms include: number eight.

Eighthman

noun

noun ·Rare ·Advanced level

Definitions

Noun

1
One of the forwards at the rear of a scrum formation who controls the ball at the back of the scrum and links to the back line. South-Africa
"Border's captain Basil Kenyon, at eighthman, again impressed with his intelligent positional play, and general leadership - as he had done in the shock win earlier in the tour."

Synonyms

All synonyms

number eight

Example

More examples

"Border's captain Basil Kenyon, at eighthman, again impressed with his intelligent positional play, and general leadership - as he had done in the shock win earlier in the tour."

Etymology

From eighth + man, from the fact that this position is the rearmost of the eight forward positions.

Related phrases

back line number eight

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Data sourced from Wiktionary, WordNet, CMU, and other open linguistic databases. Updated March 2026.