The Rugby Union Thread

fretmeister

kjdowd said:

Actually, I've watched that and it's ugly. Don't think there was intent but he could have broken his neck. 

Quite possibly. But that's not what Kone is arguing for (at this exact moment anyway) he's demanding a citing for eye area infringements and using the Welsh game as an example.

He'll shift the goalposts in a mo.

kjdowd

Question is whether the citing officer thought it was a straight red, which is the standard, and I don't think they would. Certainly didn't go for the eyes (which is what got Francis done, as this is a straight red), although it was a reckless tackle. I can see why it excites debate, but I can also see why a citing officer would cite Francis and not Watson (and, no, it isn't an English thing as I thought Marler should have been disciplined for his comments to Lee, as noted elsewhere in this thread). 

koneguitarist

@fretmeister, look at video and give me your honest unbiased view of what happened.

lloyd

Just watched the clip of the Watson/Fickou incident, not the best replays which is a shame. Tough one to call, it's challenges like that which need to be cleared up. Last season any competition in the air which left people hitting the deck was a yellow no questions asked. Hogg got one against Biggar and I'm sure there was a couple more. Not sure where I stand with the hand sin the eyes there, he's going for the ball but does appear to carry on grabbing the face after he's clearly missed the ball, but slow motion makes it look worse. No one can say whether or not he wants to get his fingers in the eyes. I wouldn't want to call that incident. You could put out a ruling that if you get your hands near the eyes recklessly then you face a sanction, but for me that sanitises the game too much. I think if that's not the first challenge of the match he probably gets a yellow for taking the man out.

koneguitarist

@lloyd, I agree no one can say he was trying to get fingers in the eye etc, but intent has nothing to do with it only outcome. I thought same about Francis, to me there was nothing malicious but he has got an 8week ban for brushing his cheek near the eye, Ashton a 10 week ban for tackling player round head and hands making contact with eye area.

As for the Hogg incident on Biggar that was a definite red and rightly so after ref seen it on big screen after giving the yellow and changing to a red. He jumped up late and lashed out with elbow into Biggars face, lifted Biggar off the floor he was hit so hard. Deserved the ban he got, that was with serious intent! 

lloyd

koneguitarist said:

@lloyd, I agree no one can say he was trying to get fingers in the eye etc, but intent has nothing to do with it only outcome. I thought same about Francis, to me there was nothing malicious but he has got an 8week ban for brushing his cheek near the eye, Ashton a 10 week ban for tackling player round head and hands making contact with eye area.

As for the Hogg incident on Biggar that was a definite red and rightly so after ref seen it on big screen after giving the yellow and changing to a red. He jumped up late and lashed out with elbow into Biggars face, lifted Biggar off the floor he was hit so hard. Deserved the ban he got, that was with serious intent! 

I could be mistaking the Hogg/Biggar one...it could have been on 1/2p two years ago. I do know there was a flurry of yellows last year (possibly the year before). I'm not sure if the laws regarding contact with the face vary from in rucks/tackles and competing in the air? I think when in the air the benefit of the doubt has to be given, his arms have to be up there to try to catch the ball. Well all will see something different though, like I say he's lucky not to have been binned for taking the man out and on another day he could have been red carded, therein lies the problems with the sport for me, too much is ignored due to 'materiality' (offsides, straight feeds, line outs not straight etc) which means any laws can be and often are ignored, or considered not wotprth enforcing, for me, if it's I the law book, you enforce it.

kjdowd

@lloyd I think the problem is that if you don't ignore some things for materiality - which, by the way I think is an excellent diagnosis of exactly what does go on quite a lot - then you wouldn't get more than 5 seconds play without the whistle blowing. Actually, I think this is something that Owens is really good at - knowing when to blow for an offence and knowing when to let the game go. Equally, I think Wayne Barnes is not a great ref - and does not ref good games - precisely because he doesn't let anything go. 

This is also relevant to the argument about the refs "coaching" the players (e.g. shouting "release", or "no", or get "back from there"). Lots of people don't think it should happen. I like it  - I think it helps the flow of the game and, again, it's something Owens does well.

As a bit of a reformed laws purist myself, I think the danger is that you can watch a terrible game of rugby in which the whistle has dominated and walk away satisfied that the laws have been relentlessly applied, while existing and potential fans turn off and walk away in droves. 

koneguitarist

@kjdowd good points, wisdom awarded, but if fans and teams are so enraged by some refs, not all then there is an issue.

Refs have to be graded as well by their performance, often we have two teams who want to play but we have a whistle happy pedantic ref like Clancy who will kill the game for teams and fans alike. 

 I personally thought Joubert was slightly harsh on Wales in first half against England, yet England were on top and SH refs generally favour attacking side, hence the turnaround in 2nd half. Again swings and roundabouts, but at least he was "fairly" consistent in how he penalised teams. 

To me a ref should ref the same way no matter who is playing and on top, this is why so many coaches do an analysis on refs to see what they favour and what they penalise. 

Poite is a perfect example of a schizophrenic ref where he will penalise one team to death for one half then the other team in 2nd half. I genuinely like Barnes, as he doesn't care who is playing and will penalise who ever is at fault, like sending McCaw off in RWC for instance, a lot of refs would have bottled that one. 

kjdowd

@koneguitarist I can agree wholeheartedly with your point that refs should be consistent. Like you say, I just don't want them to be relentless. I'd be interested to know more about how they are graded. I suspect that there is a supply problem at the highest level meaning that even if regular issues are pointed out it is difficult or impossible to wholly dispense with the services of a particular ref (I mean, how else did Steve Walsh stick around so long  ) 

All that said, it's not a job I'd want to do and rugby really does pose a unique set of challenges. Possibly the answer is more officials with tighter areas of responsibility a la american football? One thing I can say with absolute certainty is that I'd prefer much less use of the TMO. Pretty much every other sport has tech/camera usage on appeal only, and rugby should revert to this.

koneguitarist

@kjdowd agree with TMO etc, the idea of a TMO is fine, but to me a TMO should only draw refs attention to something that has a large bearing on game that ref has not seen, for instance foul play or ball dropped over line which ref ref has awarded try for. And even then ref should be sole adjudicator on. So TMO shows the footage to ref, he acts on it.

If ref then gets it wrong, then that's what he is graded on, not passing the buck, and saying I am going on advice from TMO. 

As far as Watson incident goes I don't want him banned, as it looked like an accident, but surely he should be cited  and banned for consistency, same as Ashton, Francis and everyone else. 

lloyd

Good points well made @kjdowd while Owens does let the game flow, I think he goes too far (not to mention his look at me antics, especially when he's on the touchline, always comes to have a word to get on tv....) Barnes is too whistle happy and goes too far the other way. I'd be happy for the game to be reffed either way to be honest, as long as it's done consistently.

This is one of the problems for me though, the laws should be interpreted more similarly between the refs, it seems ridiculous that at international level in a sport with that much money involved that there is such varying degrees of refs and how the game will be played out. There will always be slight differences but the gap is so wide it's shameful.

I watch a lot of football, while the game is different and possibly easier to officiate on, the standard in ref's is way superior to rugby and the difference s between them are slight. I think that over the last 10 years football ref's have improved massively, probably down to them becoming full time professionals recently. I think one of the issues we have in rugby is that in Wales at least (so I assume it's similar across the world) that there is only one full time ref-Nigel Owens.  He's basically set in stone, this must produce a certain amount of complacency across the board. My Brothers Brother in Law is a referee in South Wales who ref's at European level yet he makes no money from it, barring expenses. He's a school teacher too and works his bollocks off at his fitness and whatnot but that's surely something that needs looking at, there is surely money about to have a few F/T refs.

For me, the laws that really need tightening up are at ruck, every team sends in players from the side and off the feet at every ruck, refs ping some of them and let some go. It's understandably frustrating for fans to watch one ruck and the ref ignores opposition off the feet only for your own team to be penalised for the same thing in the next ruck.

Not supporting your own bodyweight at turnovers is another one that is rarely penalised which annoys me.

The game's so fast these days with so many complicated laws (and every player on the pitch cheating) the game should look into having multiple refs IMO as there's too much going on for one man to oversee. Scrum refs need to come in ASAP as even Nigel (best ref in the world) Owens is on record as saying he doesn't know what's happening in scrums and that it's a bit of a lottery.

crunchman

Even when you have multiple refs you still get issues.  I like the NFL, and even with 7 officials you still get controversial calls, or offences missed.

There was a key one in the Superbowl:
http://www.si.com/nfl/2016/02/15/broncos-von-miller-super-bowl-panthers-illegal-bat

Overall, I think extra officials would help, but I think you need to look at simplifying some of the rules - especially at the ruck.

kjdowd

I'd be interested to know the genuine (ie not media coached) attitude of the coaches and players. @gassage - you've probably got a better idea than most. Are they regularly hacked off with the ref and do they see a general problem here?

Fretwired

lloyd said:

Good points well made @kjdowd while Owens does let the game flow, I think he goes too far (not to mention his look at me antics, especially when he's on the touchline, always comes to have a word to get on tv....) Barnes is too whistle happy and goes too far the other way. I'd be happy for the game to be reffed either way to be honest, as long as it's done consistently.

Good grief .. you want a perfect world. It's not going to happen. IMHO rugby is being ruined by the stop/start TMO rubbish. Refs aren't always going to get it right - it's part of the game. The TMO is useful for the 'is there any reason I can't award a try' scenarios and dangerous play but it's getting beyond a joke. Owens is the best ref in the world and I thought he does very - he lets the game flow ... the world we are heading to will be a game of stop start check with 10 other officials to make sure the ref didn't miss something.

Fretwired

.

lloyd

While human beings are involved in officiating sport then bad calls and mistakes will always be there, eliminating them completely isn't a realistic aim. I have noticed that over the last few years offside calls in football have massively improved-and those decisions are bloody difficult to get right at the pace the game is played at these days. A few years ago they were getting them wrong a lot, these days not so much.

What's needed IMO is to get a more consistent interpretation across the board. I do think that simplifying the ruck laws and consistently penalising infringements would improve the game. Side entry, entering from in front of the back foot, diving off your feet and more recently clearing players beyond the ruck seem to be optionally penalised, for 'materiality' but I'm not sure how a ref can decide fairly ruck by ruck consistently what is a material offence and what isn't. The offences I mention above are easy to spot and don't need any interpretation, you're either legal or not. Start at the start of a season, go round all the clubs and tell them we're penalising those offences, won't be coaching you so don't do it, if you penalised them it would take one game for coaches to lay down the law and these things wouldn't happen again. Things like holding on, placing the ball immediately, releasing the tackled player etc are different issues and if reffed according to the laws would end rucks as part of the game.

I'd like to see simple things like scrum feeds and lineouts thrown in straight. That would overnight make them more of a contest for possession (which is how they're described in the law book) rather than 90%+ of the time an attacking platform.

For me World Rugby needs a bit of a shake up as it comes over as having large elements of the Amateur era and the officiating side hasn't caught up with the game itself. The use of the TMO is bloody terrible for example.

Fretwired

Sort the scrum out .. does anyone feed a straight ball?

lloyd

Fretwired said:

Sort the scrum out .. does anyone feed a straight ball?

Nope.

Although I always thought this was a more recent phenomenon, someone posted video of a game in the 70's in here and I was surprised to see the feeds were crooked then. Not that this makes it OK.

It's a real pet hate of mine, it's easy to spot and clearly has a material effect on who hooks the ball and in turn how the scrum is contested. I've never heard any explanation as to why it's not reffed properly. I would think that most rugby fans would like to see straight feeds in the scrum yet it's basically ignored. 

Same goes for straight line out throws.

crunchman

I think that it actually tends to be fed in straighter a lot more at the lower levels of the game.  That one is more of an enforcement issue.  The law is fine as it is.

Any law changes have to work at all levels of the game.  Law changes to make the pro game a better TV spectacle won't work unless they work at the lower levels as well.

lloyd

crunchman said:

I think that it actually tends to be fed in straighter a lot more at the lower levels of the game.  That one is more of an enforcement issue.  The law is fine as it is.

Any law changes have to work at all levels of the game.  Law changes to make the pro game a better TV spectacle won't work unless they work at the lower levels as well.

This is one of the issues, elite ref's have the power to enforce laws/infringements as they see fit according to whether they are 'material' offences or not. This is where a lot of the problems happen at elite level where they do not at lower levels-you get a lot less hands on the ball at ruck time too as you tend to get a knuckle full of studs to dissuade you....

I agree with the idea but they seem to ignore some weird ones. The scrum feed is one. Something that also confuses me is how they then go on to not ignore some laws, the main one being when the ball is available at the base of a scrum yet they blow up to re-set it.... Just let the SH get the ball out and get on with it, too much time is wasted as it is.