RDP12 Final - Leinster v Ospreys 27/05/12 - KO 4pm - RTE/TG4/S4C

castie wrote: »

What do you mean its the offense itself?
People are saying a yellow after 32 minutes is crazy.
How is that not relevant to my reply?

Personally Im saying the timing doesnt matter.
If your deemed to be taking the piss at some stage and a hair away from a yellow then youd better not repeat before I blow the final whistle.

I mean that not everybody is claiming the issue with the yellow was the lack of a warning, other people (including myself) were claiming the yellow wasn't deserved because White didn't commit an offence in the first place.

castie wrote: »

Im one of Poites biggest critics but suggesting a Scot ref instead....thats just mean!

Ha! Struggling to think of a name of one to be honest, but seriously he did a bad job of Ulster Munster and then was allowed to ref the final, really doesn't make sense to me.

That could have been one of the all time best finals but attacking play was killed on both sides with players lying on the ball and defenders offside. For ages I was really impressed with the Ospreys blitz defence but then I realised that they were offside and that's how they were closing Leinster down so fast. I'll admit though that Leinster were lying all over the ball as well though stopping turnovers!

castie wrote: »

Video is terrible so took a few watches and no way would I of spotted this in a game.

6:21 in a freeze frame I took.

http://img.ie/08ac1.png

Theres a diagonal line downwards from White through the Ospreys prop.
Hence White is shoulders below hips and so legit penalty.

I think someone said Schmidt was giving out about exactly this after the game?

Schmidt said something about the Ospreys not trying to keep the scrum up, I think primarily on Ospreys TH side.

Also, from the video I took that the Ospreys LH didn't have his bind.

castie wrote: »

Tox56 wrote: »

I found the video on youtube, and the Ospreys LH isn't binding a few seconds after the hit, when everything looks pretty straight to me as a novice, although the ref obscures the view:



And following that the Ospreys LH appears to hit the ground first, and his "shoulders were below hips" before White, at the very least it was marginal.

As I said, I'm a novice, but what I noticed live was the Ospreys LH not binding and then both sides went down almost simultaneously. What was the offence White committed?

Dont have the youtube link.
Im giving my opinion on it.

LH binds then loses his bind then goes for another bind that he gets then scrum goes down. Its not an offensive to lose and regain your bind. I wouldnt of deemed it intentional.

LH hitting the floor first is nonsense.
TH binds above LH binds below.
If the whole thing is coming down who you think is going to hit the deck first?

I don't reckon he does regain his bind before he hits the ground, and I don't see how Poite can clearly tell who was bringing the scrum down. If he was willing to issue a game changing yellow card he had to be convinced and I don't see how he can be.

Leaving aside the individual decisions, the scrummaging was poor from both sides, way below the standard of the Harlequins/Leicester game. French refs don't like to see that and somebody is usually going to pay the price for it.

Leinster were flat for this game, understandably. They never got going and Ospreys cut down the space available as well. Bishop looked lively and Williams was superb, of course. Nacewa's first try was All Black-worthy, he made it look so simple. Ospreys missed Tommy's fielding there.

I'd have to fault McFadden on Williams's first try. His attempted tackle was feeble and he left too much space on the wing again. It adds to my concern about McFadden's defensive abilities.

BarackPyjama wrote: »

Not too sure I'd be overly concerned about McFadden's defensive capabilities on that evidence alone. And we're talking about Williams here.

Reddan had him lined up for a tackle too and he went high and didn't prevent the grounding.

Morf wrote: »

Reddan isn't a huge man either but he still went at shoulder height of Williams. He should have been put into touch but he wasn't.

I think that's harsh Reddan was scrambling over and William's ducked under the tackle, he just about made it to him to get him into touch would have to have been a brilliant tackle. I can't remember if it was Kearney or McFadden that made the first attempt at tackling but they were more likely to stop Williams. Reddan was a last ditch effort, don't think you can fault him for going high on a 5 7 player ducking down!

Kearneys defense for Williams first try was really poor. He really needs to work on that area of his game.