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This is why I dislike the SANZAR local referee system in the Super Rugby tournament.
The Reds, through a penalty goal by Quade Cooper (his fifth, with a couple missed), have finally taken the lead 15-14 over the resolutely defensive Stormers. There are about 12 minutes of play left.
The Stormers kick off. They rush the catcher. The Reds scramble a ruck. It’s a mess. Referee Jaco Peyper blows his whistle for a Stormers penalty, which is converted. The scoreline is now 17-15 in favour of the Stormers.
Another ruck penalty minutes later enables the Stormers to take their lead to 20-15.
The Reds then mounted a long siege inside the Stormers’ 22 in an attempt to force a try and the possible conversion for a win. There is a penalty to them in this siege.
With time up, the Reds continue with a 20-phase attack which ends up under the Stormers posts, only metres out, and with a penalty to the Stormers.
Let’s be clear about this. The referees are not biased. However, they should not be placed in the situation where their neutrality is in any way questioned.
As someone suggested to me recently on the matter of local/neutral referees issue, justice should not only be done but needs to be seen to be done.
I have argued for years, ever since SANZAR scrapped its neutral referees system, that the local referees system does not allow justice to be seen to be done as far as partisan supporters are concerned.
And, just as importantly, it places referees like Peyper in a terrible position when they referee as they see it and then find themselves having to give crucial penalties to the local side.
So this is a plea to Lyndon Bray, the boss of referees and to SANZAR, please, please abandon the local referees system for some of the round-robin matches and all the finals in next year’s Super Rugby tournament.
Use local referees for all the inter-conference games, if you are worried about the costs involved with this change.
We’ve had Sir Graham Henry blowing up about referees recently, more like a rabid fan than as one of the greatest coaches in the history of rugby.
And this weekend we have had Dylan Hartley allegedly (and denied by Hartley) accusing referee Wayne Barnes (a Henry bete noir from the RWC 2007 final) of being a ‘f—— cheat’ during the Northampton – Leicester final.
Refereeing rugby is extremely difficult. The rugby game is chess plus body contact. The law book is overly complex, nearly 200 pages long. Bodies are being thrown in contact areas from all sorts of angles. High emotions are in play, on and off the field. A referee has to have the precise judgment of a chess master without the compensation of having plenty of time to cogitate on his decision.
He is going to make mistakes, and supporters and coaches are going to make mistakes.
Referees do not need the sort of pressure that comes from having some supporters being suspicious of their decisions. The least SANZAR can do is relieve the referees of this pressure.
The system of neutral referees worked well in the past, and there was never a good explanation why it was revoked. The only explanation offered was that the best referees should be available for the top-ranking matches.
This rationale has never been practised. Otherwise someone like, say, Craig Joubert would be refereeing the top match every round. This rarely happens, in fact.
In Round 16 next weekend, for instance, we have Glen Jackson, a very good newish New Zealand referee, handling the Crusaders – Waratahs match.
In many ways this is one of the most crucial matches in the round. A loss by the Waratahs means the end of their virtually impossible dream anyway of making the finals. The Crusaders need a win, too, to stay in contention.
Why isn’t Joubert refereeing this game?
Jaco Peyper is handling the Brumbies – Hurricanes, which makes sense. This is another crucial match with the Hurricanes, who are a point behind the Waratahs, absolutely needing a win to stay in contention for the sixth place in the finals.
The Brumbies, who are on 50 points and leading the Australian conference (with the Bulls 50, Chiefs 52 in the overall standings), need a win to consolidate their position.
The rest of the round involves local derbies which are all being handled (as they should be) by local referees: Highlanders – Blues (Jonathan White), Reds – Rebels (James Leckie), Stormers – Kings (Craig Joubert), Cheetahs – Bulls (Jonathan Kaplan).
The Blues, Reds and Cheetahs for various reasons – the Blues to have an outside chance of the six, the Reds to maintain their challenge on the Brumbies and the Cheetahs to challenge the Bulls for top of the South African conference – need victories next weekend.
But with the Australian Conference being our main interest the Reds, for me, are a more likely team to make progress in the finals than the Brumbies.
The Brumbies had perfect conditions for their negative game at Auckland. The rain was pelting down making handling virtually impossible.
The referee, the South African Lourens van der Merwe, allowed 20 minutes for endless setting and re-setting of scrums. In my opinion, the Blues generally had the dominant scrum. But when scrum penalties were handed out, they went against them. To be frank, I found this difficult to understand.
The Crusaders exploited the weakness in the Brumbies’ scrum in their convincing win over them some weeks ago. When the Brumbies play in the finals their opponents, whoever they might be, will, in my opinion, do the same to them in the scrums.
The Reds’ scrum is stronger than the Brumbies’ scrum. This is why I believe they will do well in the finals, if they can make the six. They also have far more intention to play the sort of expansive game that wins finals, as they demonstrated in 2011.
I know this is not reflected in the statistics which show the Brumbies have scored 33 tries and let in 24, while the Reds have scored 26 tries and let in 19.
Why the Reds aren’t getting the tries in the numbers they expect or deserve is something of a mystery.
But I raise this point gently knowing that the wrath of many Roarers will descend on my venerable head for even suggesting it.
Is Quade Cooper trying to do too much? Is he too much of a one-man band for the Reds? Is it relatively easy to close the Reds down by merely concentrating on closing Cooper down?
His game against the Stormers was this season’s usual confection of the brilliant, the unorthodox, the irresponsible and the uncanny.
A couple of his kicks, one made in the first phase of the match, almost released chasers to attack the Stormers try line. At times, too, his passes were things of beauty that put runners into holes they were steaming through.
Other times, though, he lost the ball or made poor choices with his passes. The mark of a great player is that he improves whatever ball he gets. Cooper sometimes does this in spades.
But at other times he shovels the ball to his team-mates who are then flattened by the surging defenders.
The Stormers concentrated on his runners, a tactic that worked to keep the Reds tryless.
And Cooper when he did run didn’t have the zip of former years.
One thing I did notice was that when other backs very occasionally acted as playmakers, the Reds backs looked potent. My suggestion here is that Cooper is perhaps over-playing his hand.
He is a bit like a rugby league playmaker, in that he is the only one in the side doing the tricks. The Reds might do better to spread the playmaking around a bit more.
I still believe the Reds will make the finals. But don’t ask me how the permutations are going to work out. And, as I say, if they make the finals they will give teams above them a torrid time.