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What are your thoughts on Bryce Lawrence’s performance during the game? He did make some good decisions; I was spitting chips when he penalised Australian hands in the ruck, and another where he called an Wallabies knock on, but both times, he was shown to be correct on reply.
However, there were some other decisions that I thought were absolute howlers.
The biggest was the Aussie counterattack on half time.
As Bob Dwyer commented on the Green and Gold rugby blog,
“For the record, the ref struggled! Amongst plenty of questions which could be asked of him, can someone please explain his decision to ‘prematurely’ blow up play, right on South Africa’s try-line, and signal half-time?”
The Argentinian commentators over here were of the same opinion.
The Aussies made a break, a ruck formed five metres from the Springbok line, and the Lawrence blew his whistle for a scrum within one second. And then called half time.
If time is up, time is up, and the referee has to call half time. But giving only one second for the ball to come out seemed very strange, and out of line with the time he allowed for the ball to come out of almost all the other rucks in the game.
This was a game changing break, there were almost no Springboks in defence, and a Wallabies try seemed likely.
Lawrence should have allowed more time for the ball to come out.
There was a similar incident on the Aussie line, earlier in the first half. The Sprinboks attacked, the Wallabies managed to recover the ball, and instead of booting it out, tried hit ups to make more space.
When the Aussie ruck was under the posts, I think it might have been Elsom who did the hit up, Lawrence blew up the ruck, to give the Wallabies a scrum as he thought the ball was trapped.
He then apologised to the Wallabies as the ball came out at the same time as he blew the whistle. Again it was a case of not giving enough time to let the ball come out.
There were many other incidents in the game that I saw as questionable. Perhaps the biggest was when Fainga did his crunching tackle, a number of Wallabies cleaned out and Australia was penalised for diving over the top in the ruck.
The Australians were not diving over the top. There were no South African players there defending, so when they cleared out, they simply went over the South African player and some fell over.
There was another incident where Sekope Kepu tackled a Springbok player. As he tackled he remained underneath the Sprinkbok. He was then penalised for not rolling away. Two points:
1. He was trapped underneath the player he tackled. There was no way he could roll away.
2. He was not interfering in any way with the Sprinboks clearing the ball. It was one of those decisions to letter of the law, but which made no sense in the context of the game.
Maybe I am just a one-eyed Wallaby supporter, but I think the refereeing performance was disastrous and very one sided, but the Wallabies didnt seem to have a chance being penalised whenever they were in attack or defence.
The penalty count was 7-1 in the first half. Your thoughts, Roarers?
Join The Roar rugby editor Christy Doran, former Wallaby Matt Toomua and a cast of regular and special guests as they look at the biggest issues in the game on The Roar Rugby Podcast. If you’re looking for great odds on the next game check out Aussie bookmaker PlayUp. Chances are you’re about to lose. Set a deposit limit.