Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

You're twisting arguments again and trying to claim something I didn't say - I didn't for a second attempt to claim McCarthy is a better player (or even remotely close to) Eben Etzebeth. I said McCarthy had the arguably more effective game of the two of them on Saturday - that was the statement you originally took exception to, but haven't given anything to support your view.

Case closed lads. South Africa investigated themselves and found no wrongdoing.

Being serious though, they're an awful set up. Having a 'law specialist' give press conferences saying how great they are, just further emboldens them to push their lies in the media.

It's pretty disgraceful that the South Africans are doing this. I thought it was wrong when Peyper took a formal role with them pretty much as soon as he retired from refereeing, but at the time it was presented as he was going to work with the Boks on the training ground to improve their discipline etc.

When he was hired, this was discussed relatively extensively:

I expressed the view then that the South Africans would use this nefariously to try and pressure and influence referees, and it's pretty much already been borne out here. Because they won at the weekend and got the rub of the green with virtually every significant decision, Jaco, the highly experienced former test referee is out patting them on the head (the same refereeing team who'll referee this coming weekend) and telling them what good little boys they are.

What would he be saying if SA had lost and had some of the decisions go against them like we had?

It's completely inappropriate as a former referee that he's doing this formally on behalf of the SA coaching ticket. He's talking and pretending like he's still some sort of neutral arbiter, but his language is a joke:

"Then it becomes a debate whether it should be a penalty to Ireland because he was touched to the neck. That is debatable," added Peyper ...'

Debatable? Taking the absolute piss.

Probably has to be done. Good for them to bring out two newer faces to the set-up to give them the experience.

Owen Doyle: Ireland-South Africa match officials unlikely to enjoy performance reviews after poor day

https://www.irishtimes.com/sport/rugby/ ... -poor-day/

“Ground control to Major Tom, you’re off your course, direction’s wrong.”

For some odd, or maybe obvious, reason David Bowie’s lyrics came to mind as Ben Whitehouse called in, or didn’t, from his TMO command centre to referee Luke Pearce.

Let’s look at the Craig Casey incident when, strangely, there was no call from Whitehouse. Casey was in possession as recent Munster team-mate RG Snyman came past the ruck, probably offside too. He first tried to impede Casey’s pass by targeting his arm. He failed, the ball was gone when he proceeded to tackle the scrumhalf, driving him backwards and into the ground where his head smacked violently on the turf. Casey was knocked out cold, it was a sickening moment of grave concern.

It was a late tackle off the ball, and pretty high too. It demanded a review, but there was only silence from the TMO. As recently as last week, this column emphasised that there are very dangerous tackles where there is no direct collision with the head, and this was one. Given the head contact protocols, the outcome may well have been excused as “a rugby incident,” a term I always find bordering on ludicrous.

But, here we are again, tethered by protocols, and not guided by the laws of the game. There is also something in the equation called a duty of care, which the tackler certainly didn’t seem overly worried about. It was 131kg driving needlessly into 76kg, clearly dangerous, and there is no greater proof of that than the outcome. I am very willing to take any brickbats of disagreement, and there’ll probably be plenty, I’d guess, from South Africa.

But such a tackle, which can result in a very serious brain injury, merits a lot more than “play on”, There have to be consequences. I don’t believe that the TMO should be the final arbiter of such player actions, involving serious injury. It has to be the ref’s call.

Neither can I comprehend how Pearce, watching Casey receive prolonged treatment, didn’t want to see for himself. Caelan Doris certainly wanted him to, but instead he told the player off, albeit politely.

Whitehouse did call up Pearce, to deny James Lowe a try, after a wondrous run down the touchline. Hawk-eyed, the TMO had spotted a potential offence by Ronan Kelleher in a ruck, seconds before. The hooker had gone to ground, the ball striking his foot before emerging on Ireland’s side. Pearce had a direct view of it, and had not whistled it. That’s the crux of the matter – it was a referee decision in a ruck, not for the TMO. However, what he should have picked up was the neck roll on Kelleher which helped put him on the deck in the first place. Ireland would then, at least, have had a penalty, which instead went the other way.

Lowe mixed the good with the bad. His successful attempt to keep the ball in play, with no idea of who was behind him, was unwise. The risk-reward balance was unfavourably skewed, quite the opposite of his sumptuous offload for Jamie Osborne’s score. It led directly to Kolbe’s try, although it took a lengthy study to decide that Lowe was no longer in possession before his foot was on the ground in touch.

There is a another consideration here. The law states that the ball is in touch if it, or the ball carrier, touches the touchline or anything beyond. Having released the ball, the question is, if it then hit Lowe’s thigh, does that qualify as “anything beyond” the touchline. There’ll be mixed views on it, with the only opinion which counted – Whitehouse’s – ruling that there was nothing clear and obvious for Pearce to overturn his on-field “try” decision.

Lowe was also involved in the correctly awarded penalty try for South Africa. Playing the ball deep in Ireland’s in-goal, uncharacteristically he fumbled it; Pearce awarded the inevitable five-metre scrum. The “bomb squad” had arrived en masse, just in time to play a mere 30 minutes of an 80-minute match, which raises again serious safety concerns. They did their business, completely splintering the Ireland pack, with Kelleher singled out for a yellow card.

There was more TMO involvement when the referee was persuaded by Doris to look at his grounding of the ball for a possible try in the second half. One camera angle showed the ball to be short of the line, and that was enough for Whitehouse to rule it out. But there was another angle which seemed to show a clear, if very brief, grounding. Ireland will have a big query on this one, among many others.

Doris and Pearce had an interesting relationship throughout the afternoon, with the Irishman getting under the ref’s skin at times. That’s not really a great idea, but, at times, it was hard to blame him. Assistant Rob Dickson, in charge next Saturday, will have taken good note of the exchanges. The match officials are unlikely to enjoy their performance reviews. They had a poor day, in what was a thunderously ferocious contest.

In addition to World Rugby’s specialist review group on the red card replacement, there are two additional groups working away. One is studying the whole matter of TMO involvement; the other on the question of replacements, aka “bomb squads”.

The groups are due to come up with recommendations for adoption by World Rugby’s council, in November. That meeting cannot come soon enough, both have evolved into something which was never intended. They are in real Major Tom territory – completely off course