It's basically for safety, so the people playing do not get hurt. Without pads there would be injuries all the time, and maybe even deaths, and its hard to find good football players, but mainly it's for safety and to keep them secure.
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There are only shoulder pads, shin pads and scrum caps allowed. The main shoulder pads are ther to protect a main bones in the should from damage when tackling. For the front row they stop the "hit" causing damage to a certain degree
footballers were shin pads to protect their shins when a player slide tackles them
You don't and they don't. They generally wear knee and thigh pads but most skill postion players choose not to wear those either. I played for years and have NEVER seen shin pads!