The language of rugby

Language is not only the most significant tool of communication, but a powerful force when it comes to propaganda and manipulation, and the media are experts.

As defined in Forbes, media manipulation “shapes everything you read, hear and watch online”. It’s about exploiting “the difference between perception and reality”.

Basically, the industry realises that, if they can “generate enough online buzz people will assume that where there is smoke there is fire … and the unreal becomes real”.

Doesn’t this sound like the media circus around New Zealand rugby?

The language journalists (and now more frequently coaches) use when discussing the All Blacks is often loaded in order to connote negativity. This is done with intent.

The fallacy of the old adage, “sticks and stones may break my bones but words will never hurt me” is well advertised as being folly. We know the power words have. We know the ramification they can have. And yet they are bandied around with a fervent passion, regardless of the truth or consequences.

The “we’ve got to start cheating better” statement by ex-Wallaby Stephen Hoiles is an example of discriminatory speech. The weak excuse of it being a “tongue in cheek” joke to “lighten the mood” after the social media backlash, shows the true intent of Hoiles.

(Photo by Hannah Peters/Getty Images)

It wasn’t tongue-in-cheek nor was it meant as a joke. It was said with, one must presume considering he is a sportscaster, knowledge of what would follow. An apology is all very well and good, but the damage has already been done and cannot be undone.

But what kind of an apology is it, when he merely uses synonyms for the word “cheat” and discusses the “dark arts” of NZ rugby? In his ‘apology’ on Fox Sports, he pointed out a few instances of the Crusaders’ “ability to bend, stretch and manipulate the 21 laws of the game”, but not once did he mention any infringement from the Waratahs.

I consider a punch to be dirty, and yet the punch Rob Simmons threw in the line-out was ignored, as was Bernard Foley pushing a Crusader’s head into the ground after he scored a try.

So congratulations Stephen for providing clickbait for your employer, making the advertisers happy and getting your name in global publications. Personally, I don’t believe there’s any room in rugby for discriminatory remarks.

The first All Blacks Test for the year became more of a talking point about on-field tactics rather than the rugby itself. Allegations and name-calling isn’t anything new for New Zealand. Every season rekindles the old insults.

If the All Blacks aren’t being called “cheats”, they’re being called “thugs” or “dirty”. They are accused of illegal play when other teams do the exact same things without being admonished. And while the All Blacks have been accused many times in the past of intimidating referees, the recent allegation of referees being “subconsciously lenient” on them is new.

Each word (cheats, dirty, illegal, and intimidation) has been, is, and no doubt will continue to be used with clinical precision to detract from New Zealand’s rugby prowess. It shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone that this anti-NZ sentiment is due to the dominance of New Zealand rugby.

(Photo by Cameron Spencer/Getty Images)

The detractors have no answer as to how a country with a population of only 4.6 million (with 150,727 registered rugby players), is so good. This is particularly impressive when compared to Canada’s 27,512 registered and 156,571 total rugby players, Ireland’s 101,922/190,422, South Africa’s’s 405,438/467,856, France’s 542,242/634,028, Australia’s 230,753/669,635, the USA’s 119,682/1,527,561 and England’s 382,154/2,139,604.

So they have to believe in the answers given by the media; cheating, dirty, illegal and intimidation. I guess it’s just too difficult to give credit where credit is due.

However, I thought it might be interesting to explore each adjective and how it’s applied to the All Blacks.

Cheating

The All Blacks play regularly play ‘on’ the letter of the law. How is this cheating? Surely knowing the laws of the sport you’re playing is a rudimentary skill of the game?

Just because there are discrepancies with the level of knowledge of the laws between teams (and referees) doesn’t mean the All Blacks cheat. It makes them smart rugby players. When Italy played England in the 2017 six nations, and refused to engage at the breakdown, it took England a full 40 minutes to work out what to do.

As written by David Bodilly in The Mirror, James Haskell and Dylan Hartley went up to Romain Poite, the referee, and asked what the law was. In response, Poite said, “I’m not your coach, I’m the referee. It’s not for me to work out your strategies”. Shouldn’t the team have known what to do?

Bodilly said New Zealand would probably be the only country that would’ve coped. “Their players seem to know every single nuance of the laws of the game,” he was quoted as saying to The Mirror.

(Photo by Anthony Au-Yeung/Getty Images)

Jeremy Guscott wrote for the BBC, saying “if Conor O’Shea’s side had tried it against New Zealand, the All Blacks still would have sussed it out straight away” because “their on-the-field problem-solving and mental agility is what sets them apart from the rest of world rugby”.

So, obviously, the way the All Blacks play rugby is that they know the rules inside out. That knowledge empowers the players to make decisions and play 80 minutes of fast, running rugby and does not equate to cheating.

Dirty

Playing the game hard is not synonymous with playing dirty. A dirty player is one who tackles with intent to injure. Even Sonny Bill Williama’ shoulder charge on Anthony Watson during the second Lions match, while being reckless, dangerous and thoughtless, was not dirty.

It was more of a throwback to his league days. Stupid? Yes. Dirty? No.

Punching someone in a lineout, like Simmons did in the Waratahs vs Crusaders match in Round 13 of this year’s Super Rugby? Dirty. Israel Folau pulling Dillyn Leyds’s hair in a tackle? Dirty.

In the first test between the All Blacks and France, Sam Cane’s tackle was high. It was not deemed worthy of a card or citing by the match officials because Remy Grosso was dipping.

Now, I wouldn’t have been aggrieved if Cane had received a yellow card. Although two wrongs don’t make a right, it would’ve at least been a consistent call due to the yellow card Paul Gabrillagues’ received earlier in the match. The head clash between Cane, Ofa Tu’ungafasi and Grosso was an unfortunate accident – how can an accident be deemed dirty?

I read people point out that, as the head clash resulted in a double fracture for Grosso, the level of his resulting injury should have determined the level of sanction.

So let’s open the doors for coaches to ask players to feign injury in hope of yellow or red-carding an opposition player. The master of objectivity, Stephen Jones, called for Cane and Tu’ungafasi to be charged for assault. But where was his condemnation when Richie McCaw was being targeted by every international team he played?

We’ve all seen the “putting his body on the line” video, showing the dirty and reckless tackles involving elbows and shoulders to his head. Why wasn’t Jones calling for players to be charged then? Where was Augustin Pichot’s tweet about foul play being cited then? The rugby world was silent, and that silence was deafening.

The pundits use the number of cards the All Blacks receive to ‘prove’ how dirty they are. It’s true, they do receive a lot.

In 2017, Argentina and New Zealand both received eight yellow cards and one red card, however, New Zealand played three more tests. How do Argentina escape being called dirty?

Australia received six yellows and one red, England, Ireland, South Africa and Scotland all received four yellows, France received three, Wales received two and Italy received one (8).

The nine cards New Zealand received in 2017 was the highest tally in ten years.

From the world cup in 2015 through June 2017, Australia received a card per 1.31 games, New Zealand per 1.88 games, Argentina 1.89, Scotland 2.83, France 2.83, England 2.5, South Africa 2.33, Italy 2, Ireland 3.17, and Wales 6.33.

Since international rugby started, New Zealand has received a total of three red cards, along with Ireland and Scotland. Australia has received four, England five, Argentina and Wales six, South Africa eight, Italy and France 11 each. Yet, only NZ is referred to in the media (and by keyboard warriors) as being dirty!

Illegal

The headline stating that the tackle on Grosso was illegal was inflammatory. Jacques Brunel, the French coach, may have retracted his words, but the damage was already done. I believe post-match media conference ‘outbursts’ such as this are orchestrated for one purpose – to plant seeds in the minds of the match officials for the next game.

Warren Gatland did this throughout the Lions tour of New Zealand, and I consider the practice to be outside the core values of rugby. There’s NO integrity trying to win a rugby match by influencing refs.

There’s no sportsmanship in trying to sway officials in your own favour by bleating to the media. Rugby is a game that should be played on the field, not in media conferences. It’s in these instances that Steve Hansen, and now Ian Foster, hold their own.

While replies are made, they’re generally made without emotive language being used. I respect them for that. Leave the gamesmanship to the players.

Intimidation

The first time I’d heard that the All Blacks allegedly intimidate match officials was in 2011, as a result of beating France by one point in the wporld cup final. I actually thought nothing of it. Put it down to the usual anti-All Black rhetoric after a win.

Have you noticed that these allegations only follow wins? Dimitri Yachvili, the French halfback, claimed to The Guardian that Craig Joubert “did not want us to win” after the game

I’m not sure if Yachvili is psychic or not, but when a statement like that is made, with only opinion to back it up, it’s nothing more than click bait.

Why is a player allowed to call the reputation of a ref into question? He should have been sanctioned for that.

After the 21-9 win over Ireland in Dublin in 2016, Matt Williams, the Ireland A coach at the time, claimed in stuff.co.nz, the “All Blacks intimidate referees who are fearful of their careers being affected by being too harsh on the world’s No. 1 rugby team”. He said, “the best in the game are intimidated by what New Zealand will say about them post-match. They have buried people’s careers and they have survived other people’s careers. It is a very big flaw in our game that they can get away with this”.

Firstly, I’ve only ever heard Hansen ask for consistency – whether we win or lose. How is that burying a career?

Secondly, I can’t help wondering that if New Zealand holds so much power, how have we ended up with the super rugby conference system?

Surely a Union that wields enough power to dictate to every international refereeing team they come across, should have been able to withstand the pressure to accept a system that is designed to contain their teams!

Williams believes that “There’s absolutely no doubt that New Zealand are being refereed differently”. So my question is, if New Zealand intimates refs, why was only Sonny Bill Williams red-carded in the second Lions Test and not Mako Vunipola for his head high tackle on the prone Beauden Barrett?

In contrast, Jonathan Kaplan said to The Sydney Morning Herald, “I was never exposed to any form of coercion or suggestion, and when their national team lost those first two matches they were nothing but gracious to their opponents as well as me as a rookie referee”.

He also said, “While none of their captains or coaches ever stepped over the mark with me (that includes Richie McCaw), they certainly do put a lot of heat on the referee and force him to make decisions, which can be quite daunting for young referees who have not been coached correctly in dealing with pressure”.

But the All Blacks are not the only ones who apply heat and force the ref to make a decision. Am I the only one who remembers Sam Warburton working overtime with Romain Poite to get him to overturn his offside decision in the third Lions test? What about Dan Biggar and Alun Wyn Jones complaining about England’s fourth try in a Test in 2016?

The most hypocritical example of the intimidation accusation was from Brendan Gallagher who, as observed by The Chase Sport in the space of half an hour “had moved from tweeting his forceful admiration that Nigel Owens was ‘not being intimidated’ by the All Blacks (after penalising New Zealand consistently for offside in the first half) to righteous indignation that the Welshman was yet another official ostensibly under Steve Hansen’s thumb”.

Surely, he’s either being intimidated or he’s not. Gallagher’s see-sawing between the two sides coincided with his own national team leading the All Blacks to eventually losing to them.

Does nobody else see the hypocrisy involved?

In 2013 Stuart Barnes, former England first-five, was quoted by odt.co.nz as saying “that the All Blacks are currently earning undue favour from referees”.

(Photo by Phil Walter/Getty Images)

So the forward pass from Damien Traille to Frederic Michalakat at the 2007 world cup was Wayne Barnes favouring the ABs?

What about Luke McAllister being yellow-carded in that very same game? Two things in one match, and it’s the All Blacks who are accused of being favoured?

The latest allegation of the All Blacks being the recipient of subconscious leniency just doesn’t ring true. In fact, there’s more than enough evidence to prove the exact opposite.

In the second Lions match, Sonny Bill rightly received a red card for his shoulder charge, but Vunipola received a much lighter sanction for an arguably worse tackle on Barrett.

In that same match, Maro Itoje was a repeat offside offender and, as such, should’ve been yellow carded for the repeat offences. But he wasn’t even sanctioned so got away with it.

And, of course, the final. Where was the leniency, subconscious or otherwise, in the overturning of the calls that could’ve potentially won the series for the home side?

The “subconscious leniency” allegation comes from an elite English referee who has never reffed the All Blacks.

Think about what he’s implying. Rob Debney is suggesting that professional referees are so weak-kneed that they buckle under All Blac pressure. Does this mean that no other teams provide pressure?

Well he should know that’s not true because he had an altercation with Gloucester’s head coach, Dean Ryan in a match against Saracens in 2007 which resulted in Ryan being banned for 12 weeks by the RFU.

If there was any truth to this allegation, why would the All Blacks be one of the most carded teams in international rugby?

As Ian Foster said to Sportsjoe after the first French test this year, “I think if you look at the penalty counts [and] yellow cards last year, we were one of the top yellow-carded teams in the world so I’m not sure how this soft on us [notion] comes to fruition”.

How can the number of yellow cards the All Blacks receive be used as evidence as to how “dirty” they are, but conveniently ignored when they’re accused of being favoured by the refs?

I am in no way suggesting they don’t sometimes get the timing of their tackles wrong. In a sport played at the speed rugby is now played, it would be nigh impossible to get it right all the time.

But what I am suggesting, is that all teams are guilty of what the All Blacks alone are accused of. How can common sense not prevail when journalists and coaches try to persuade officials and the public only New Zealand are at fault? Are people really that easy to manipulate?

Most of us come from countries with educational systems that teach critical thinking; why is that particular skill lost when the All Blacks are involved?

One word: jealousy.

They have no answer for the domination of the All Blacks.

I suggest when the All Blacks are singled out and accused of all manner of things, we as supporters should thank the accuser.

Thank them for their backhanded compliment. Because when they say New Zealand cheat, what they mean is “your guys were so good, we simply had no answer.”

When they accuse the All Blacks of being “dirty” what they mean is, “how on earth do your guys play like that?” The accusations come from a dark place. A place where appreciation and giving credit where it’s due is sadly missing.