OK, you got me with that one

Your points are valid. Putting your intake in the wrong place will hurt performance, putting it in the right place will boost performance. Rear facing is less prone to water or rubbish being sucked in, but if the intake is the wrong shape or in the wrong place it will be very bad (venturi effect). Front facing intakes are also legally a gray area at best (pedestrian injuries and reduced visibility).

i have a 4'' flexy pipe runing from the botom of the small hole in the bar then cut a hole throu the iner gard to the air box fited a pod in the air box then 3'' tube to the tb works great
just put some mesh in the bar to stop rubish geting in

Back to having a pod filter sticking out of the bonnet, is that illegal? Because you see carburetter vehicles with their air filters poking threw the bonnet. Is that illegal too? And for the reference, my mate has an XF Falcon with an XE carbie motor that has the airfilters threw the bonnet. He purchased a scoop from Autobarn and stuck it on.

spend your money on more engine work and then just remove the restrictions from the in. sys. you'll get more power for the money and time your looking at spending

reverse faceing scoops or vents will suck air out....
look at alot of the jap bonnets particularly drift bonnets....the reverse type facing scoops in there bonnets ( usually made into the bonnet not as an add on on top) give the hot air that has just pasted through the front mount intercooler somewhere to go....
the air passing aver the bonnet creates a vacuum sucking the hot air out.

so if u had ur intake usesin a reverse facing scoop wouldnt that be making it hard 4 the engine to suck air in as it is already tryin to b pulled out by the air rushing over the bonnet???

i have cosworth vents & the one on the n/s is right over the pod (with el induction setup), previoudly i had the top of the box open to create a cross flow into the box from the bottom & out through the top through the vent. (air into the bottom of box is fed from front bar)

but when i poked the pod back down into the box & closed the top of the box off driveability increased (read: not kw) & when getting to operating temp not suffering such a lack in performance compared colder temps. drawing vents (facing back) are only good for evacuating heat from the engine bay & if the heat is leaving the bonnet vent & the engine is trying to suck in from the same vent you might end up picking up more hot air.
just my 2c