Former Wallabies launch scathing criticism on TMO Ben Skeene

Kdog, I said pretty much the same thing to the guys I was with. In the "Good-ole days" players were less likely to infringe for fear of "rough justice" Roll away or get smashed. There is a famous bit of footage where Ritchie was sitting on his backside hands in the side of a ruck where the ref couldn't see. A Bok player came flying over the the top forearm first hitting him in the face. Cost him a red card, but the initial infringement was a McCaw special. I think that the short answer is that players need to be more like half backs. Instead of diving in, they need to be whiny little b's like AB halfbacks waiving their arms like spider monkey's, pointing at a player infringing. Forwards don't tend to have the luxury of standing around, hoping the Ref blows the whistle. Their job is to clear the ruck so his half can get the ball to the next phase quickly. Their coach would have told them to "get in there", not wait for a whistle.

The problem is that the TMO should never interfere in a match like that. As much as I don't like his calls like everyone else, but you cannot blame Ben for doing what he CAN do. The laws allow him to do that. These laws needs to change ASAP. Its ruining the game esp if you got wannabe ref Ben as TMO.

The refereeing has been ok. The Australian commentary has been woeful and these washed up plodders are a waste of space. They are cavemen in a modern world. There brains have been scattered by too many head high hits.

What about laying on the ball, is there no personal responsibility for your actions, if the Welsh player did not lay on the ball, the clean out would never had occurred, so an illegal action is ignored, even though it mitigates the action. I'm not saying the hit wasn't dangerous, but if the rucks not being reffed correctly, how can you give a yellow for all subsequent actions? As for the passing, it is agreed the ball will travel forward because of momentum, it's stated in the regulations, to look at in slow motion does not do the pass justice

Why does New Zealand have some of the fastest race horses in the world? Because the horses have seen what they do with their sheep.

My opinion will be controversial, Apart from the tempo of the games being slowed to a crawl, I have been reasonably happy with the decisions. Flip the conversation and if Garces had ruled some of those forward passes were OK or the touchie (Poite?) had made the wrong call in or out, we would have been baying for their blood instead. Owens's's Fijian pancake flip was adjudicated according to the laws, Landed on his back...... The commentators should probably shut their mouths and set a good example to accept the referee's decision. When the kids play on the weekend, they think it is OK to badmouth the Ref. I think it is up to the judiciary to decide if further sanctions are required for the nature of the tackle, hold your poison arrows until we find out if that is taken further. Hodge got 3 games for an incident that was a penalty only from memory. I have to give them credit, instead of blowing the pea out of the whistle and stopping the game immediately, they are letting the game go on and then "Back Checking" to see if anything was missed. I suspect that there are a number of nervous kiwi's and Poms out there, The yellow card for no arms in the ruck cleanout will mean that a number of forwards will need to tweak their technique. The "Flat" passes may become a little more backward in future too.

except that's actually one of his jobs, especially in the phases leading up to a try.

Yep I thought as I listened to these guys that Skeene must be utterly hopeless. Except most of the things he picked up were actually spot on and legitimate. The one thing the Ref and TMO got wrong was the tackle by the Welsh 2 where he lifted the player over his shoulder…. that should have been a red card imho. Bad error Skeene, bad error.

Yep the AB's are lucky they never have Skeene as a TMO.

Ben Skeen is the type of bloke who would write "I was here" on the dunny door and then sign his name.

Well then, WR and RWC officialdom won't need to worry about selecting Skeen for the GF, will they??? The ABs will do them all, a favour.......oh and former WBs too.

I once saw Tim Skeen reading a complimentary newspaper at a cafe. He folded the pages back over themselves to fit the paper on the table, and when he finished, he didn’t put all the pages back in order.

I once saw Skeen kick a cat. Ok, it wasn’t actually Skeen, he just suggested to another bloke that the cat might need to be kicked, the other bloke actually kicked it. 2 other blokes were there too, but they said and did nothing to stop it or to suggest to the bloke doing the kicking that he should do anything else other than kick the cat. So, yea, definitely Skeen is the mastermind. All it takes for people like Skeen to prosper is for good men to stand by and do nothing. Note, no animals, cats or otherwise, were hurt in the typing of this post. And I in no way endorse, condone or legitimise cruelty to animals in any way. Even cats.

Yep. Agree. TMO goes looking for indiscretions well after the play has moved on and no-one is hurt (as was the case with the Fijian yellow). Skeen is ruining the game.