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An intriguing aspect of the opening round of the 2015 Rugby Championship is that the referees are being tested for their RWC tournament possibilities as Australia, South Africa, Argentina and New Zealand battle for form.
The referee for Friday’s opening match between the All Blacks and Pumas at Christchurch is the South African Craig Joubert, with South Africans Jaco Peyper and Stuart Berry as assistant referees, and Australian George Ayoub as the TMO.
On Saturday, when the Wallabies play the Springboks at Brisbane, the referee is Welshman Nigel Owens, with New Zealanders Glen Jackson and Mike Fraser as assistant referees, and New Zealander Ben Skeen as the TMO.
It seems to me that World Rugby is trialling Joubert, the best referee in the southern hemisphere, and Owen, the best northern hemisphere referee, for the finals and the coveted final (if the Springboks or Wales are not playing) of the 2015 Rugby World Cup.
Joubert still carries the unfair burden of being criticised by French rugby officials and anti-All Blacks supporters around the world (it has been especially virulent from Australians for some reason) for his refereeing of the 2011 Rugby World Cup final.
But Joubert makes the valid point that with 20 minutes to go, he awarded France a kickable penalty. As the All Blacks gathered under their posts waiting for the kick, they discussed what they would do if the kick went over.
But given the meltdown at Cardiff in the quarter-final of the 2007 Rugby World Cup tournament against France, it is most unlikely the All Blacks could have changed the momentum of the Eden Park Test in their favour.
Joubert knew, then, when he awarded this penalty that he had placed himself in the same sort of Dantesque level of hell that New Zealanders have reserved for Wayne Barnes, the referee in 2007.
The pressure on Joubert, though, was much tougher as the 2011 final was in New Zealand.
Privately and publicly, Joubert rightly claims he is enormously proud of that decision to allow France to take the lead.
Since then he has given a wrong decision against the Crusaders Richie McCaw in the final of the 2014 Super Rugby tournament that allowed Bernard Foley to kick the Waratahs to glory.
In Friday’s match, Joubert’s ability to referee the scrums accurately will be under scrutiny.
The Pumas have made no secret of the fact that they are targeting the All Blacks scrum as a way of establishing control in the Test, garnering points through penalties and possibilities of yellow cards for repeated infringements.
But in the past, the Wallabies and the South Africans, especially, have complained about the illegal tactics used by the Pumas at scrum time, including boring in continually, that have been condoned by less than vigilant referees.
The Pumas captain, Juan Martin Ferdandez Lobbe (like West Indian crickets, Pumas players often have splendidly baroque names), says that if the Pumas play “a perfect game,” keep the penalty count down to under 10 and clear the ball from rucks within three seconds and the All Blacks “have a bad day,” his side has a fighting chance of winning the Test.
But these same requirements fit the All Blacks style of play, too.
If Joubert is in good form (which he almost always is), both teams, provided they play within the laws, should be able to achieve the good set pieces and the quick ruck ball to set up a challenging Test that is full of strong running and hard shouldered tackling.
Joubert is unabashed in his commitment to referee for try-scoring rugby. This is one of the reasons, along with his accuracy in his rulings, why I regard him so highly as a Test referee.
The one caveat I would make in this assessment is that some times this dedication to try-scoring rugby is overwhelmed by a disregard for what he calls “cynical” rugby. During the Super Rugby tournament, Joubert gave a yellow card against the Chiefs in the first minute of the match for “cynical play.”
I think Jaco Peyper, who refereed the Super Rugby final and the Manu Samoa – All Blacks Test with aplomb, showed terrific judgement in the final when, early on in the game Aaron Smith stopped the Hurricanes from playing on quickly when only metres away from the Highlanders line.
There was the temptation, no doubt, for give Smith a yellow card for cynical play. But Peyper resisted this temptation. This was a final. A yellow card is a tremendous liability, especially early on in the match.
The Highlanders were warned. And play went on with both sides having 15 men on the field, as they should have.
One further point about Friday’s officiating group: Ayoub needs to temper his enthusiasm to referee the match from the TMO box. Too often this season, it has been Ayoub trolling through videos to bring something or other to the attention of the referee, often well after the incident has been perpetrated.
TMO-itis threatens to slow down rugby unless it is cured with a hefty dose of telling TMOs to just stick, essentially, to “try or no try” decisions.
Getting to the Wallabies vs Springboks Test, the point has to be made that in the past Owens has not been a favourite referee for the ARU. And rightly so.
Some years ago when he refereed the Wallabies off the park, he was the subject of a ferocious (and justified) attack on his refereeing credibility from the ARU to officials of World Rugby (the IRB).
Early on his career as a Test referee, Owen was inclined to be excitable and one-dimensional in awarding flows of penalties in one particular direction.
In the eyes of the ARU, for instance, he was particularly harsh on the Wallabies scrum, in defiance it argued of what was actually happening on the field.
Just as players should play what is in front of them, so should referees. One of the dangers this Rugby World Cup year is that no matter how much the Wallabies scrum will improve under the tough coaching of it by Michael Cheika, many referees will look at history rather than the actuality and penalise the Wallaby scrum unfairly.
Hopefully, Owens will not come to Suncorp Stadium with preconceptions about the Wallabies scrum. I expect the scrum to be much better than it has been in the past. And if it is, the Wallabies need to be rewarded for their improvements.
Owens, in my opinion, has reached the sort of refereeing maturity that he lacked, perhaps, when he first started his Test refereeing.
We (and I include myself in this) are too often critical of young referees as they learn what is a devilishly hard job of interpreting hundreds of complex laws while huge, agitated players smash into each other in collisions that have the impact of a major car crash.
It takes some time before the young referee starts to see the action not as a blur but in slow motion, a knack that leads to decisive and accurate refereeing. And a sort of invisibility of the referee (Peyper in the Hurricanes – Highlanders final), which the best achieve when on form.
Owen, in my view, has reached this blessed state.
It will not be his fault, I would think, if the Wallabies and the Springboks cannot play in an entertaining and winning fashion at Suncorp Stadium.
I would hope, too, that he and his assistant referees heed the instruction of World Rugby that the attacking side in the rolling maul is refereed with the same vigilance for illegalities as the defending side.
The point here is that rugby is a game where offences against the laws can be crucial to the outcome of the match. A tennis player can miss a majority of his first serves and still win the game and ultimately the match. But a rugby side that gets on the wrong side of the penalty count (as Lobbe recognised) can rarely win a Test.
World Rugby statistics, for instance, indicate that in the seven Rugby World Cup finals there have been nine tries scored and 38 penalties kicked.
The French call the home crowd “the 16th player”.
But it would be more accurate, given this statistic that shows the importance of winning and kicking penalties in Rugby World Cup finals, to call the referee “the 16th player.”