England vs South Africa - 1st Quilter International

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Date: Saturday 3rd November 2018
Time: 15:00
Location: Twickenham Stadium

Referee:       Angus Gardiner (Aus)
Assistant 1: Jerome Garces (France)
Assistant 2: Ben Whitehouse (Wales)
TMO:            Olly Hodges (Ireland)




Teams


England

15 Elliot Daly (Wasps, 21 caps), 14 Jack Nowell (Exeter Chiefs, 26 caps), 13 Henry Slade (Exeter Chiefs, 13 caps), 12 Ben Te’o (Worcester Warriors, 13 caps), 11 Jonny May (Leicester Tigers, 37 caps), 10 Owen Farrell (Saracens, 61 caps) co-captain, 9 Ben Youngs (Leicester Tigers, 77 caps), 1 Alec Hepburn (Exeter Chiefs, 2 caps), 2 Dylan Hartley (Northampton Saints, 93 caps) co-captain, 3 Kyle Sinckler (Harlequins, 13 caps), 4 Maro Itoje (Saracens, 22 caps), 5 George Kruis (Saracens, 25 caps), 6 Brad Shields (Wasps, 2 caps), 7 Tom Curry (Sale Sharks, 4 caps), 8 Mark Wilson (Newcastle Falcons, 4 caps).
 
16 Jamie George (Saracens, 28 caps), 17 Ben Moon (Exeter Chiefs, uncapped), 18 Harry Williams (Exeter Chiefs, 11 caps), 19 Charlie Ewels (Bath Rugby, 6 caps) , 20 Zach Mercer (Bath Rugby, uncapped), 21 Danny Care (Harlequins, 81 caps), 22 George Ford (Leicester Tigers, 47 caps), 23 Manu Tuilagi (Leicester Tigers, 26 caps).




South Africa


15 Damian Willemse, 14 S’bu Nkosi, 13 Jesse Kriel, 12 Damian de Allende, 11 Aphiwe Dyantyi, 10 Handre Pollard, 9 Ivan van Zyl, 8 Warren Whiteley, 7 Duane Vermeulen, 6 Siya Kolisi, 5 Pieter-Steph du Toit, 4 Eben Etzebeth, 3 Frans Malherbe, 2 Malcolm Marx, 1 Steven Kitshoff

Substitutes: 16 Bongi Mbonambi, 17 Thomas du Toit, 18 Wilco Louw, 19 RG Snyman, 20 Lood de Jager, 21 Embrose Papier, 22 Elton Jantjies, 23 André Esterhuizen.

I don't see a still image. I posted 2 gifs.

RugbyFan100 wrote:Lovely contact with the eyes here too. The game is a mess.

This one is showing as a still image, although now having quoted it I can see it is intended to be a GIF from the code

Weird goings on at 606 HQ in that case.

All I can see is 2 different still images - as you say must be some issues on the site ...

Heaf wrote:All I can see is 2 different still images - as you say must be some issues on the site ...

Weird. Is this any different?

RugbyFan100 wrote:

Heaf wrote:All I can see is 2 different still images - as you say must be some issues on the site ...

Weird. Is this any different?

I saw that during the game and thought it looked a bit dodgy. Never good when you see a players hands in another players face.

Doesn't look like an eye gouge but it is a really stupid thing to do. He wouldn't be able to complain if he was cited.

RugbyFan100 wrote:

Heaf wrote:All I can see is 2 different still images - as you say must be some issues on the site ...

Weird. Is this any different?

Yep

Collapse2005 wrote:Doesn't look like an eye gouge but it is a really stupid thing to do. He wouldn't be able to complain if he was cited.

There is a point before his hand is pushed away when it looks like his fingers make contact with the 'eye area' which is normally enough for a ban ...

https://laws.worldrugby.org/?law=9

Looking at the world rugby law number 16 with respect to "A player must not charge or knock down an opponent carrying the ball without attempting to grasp that player" the video shows a tackle that I got to say looks a lot tamer to Farrell's tackle.

Seems kind of obvious that Gardner as good as he is got it wrong.

Collapse, I think most people would agree that Gardner would have been within the letter of the law to award a penalty or YC. But the point is that it was not the only bad tackle in that game for which he did not award a sanction, including a far worse one where Snyman and another SA player actually made shoulder-to-head contact.

Gardner applied a consistently more lenient interpretation of the tackle laws than many of us would like throughout the game. We may wish he hadn't, but at least he was consistent.

If he had penalised Farrell, England could feel very aggrieved that South Africa weren't at least a man down for some of the game.

Poorfour wrote:Collapse, I think most people would agree that Gardner would have been within the letter of the law to award a penalty or YC. But the point is that it was not the only bad tackle in that game for which he did not award a sanction, including a far worse one where Snyman and another SA player actually made shoulder-to-head contact.

Gardner applied a consistently more lenient interpretation of the tackle laws than many of us would like throughout the game. We may wish he hadn't, but at least he was consistent.

This is an awful mindset. It's what Brian Moore said about it.

It's against the laws. It's foul play and could have resulted in serious injury. To ignore it once, twice, three times or all game is utterly inexcusable.

I really don't think the Snyman one was worse.

RugbyFan100 wrote:

Poorfour wrote:Collapse, I think most people would agree that Gardner would have been within the letter of the law to award a penalty or YC. But the point is that it was not the only bad tackle in that game for which he did not award a sanction, including a far worse one where Snyman and another SA player actually made shoulder-to-head contact.

Gardner applied a consistently more lenient interpretation of the tackle laws than many of us would like throughout the game. We may wish he hadn't, but at least he was consistent.

This is an awful mindset. It's what Brian Moore said about it.

It's against the laws. It's foul play and could have resulted in serious injury. To ignore it once, twice, three times or all game is utterly inexcusable.

To be clear: I agree. As a coach and ref myself, player safety is the highest priority and it angers me when a referee does not take it seriously. But in rugby the ref is the sole arbiter of the laws. It's also reasonable to make the point that saying "England would have lost if Gardner had refereed that tackle correctly" is taking too narrow a view, because there were plenty of tackles on both sides that were not refereed by the normal interpretation. If they had, it would have been a very different game.

Collapse2005 wrote:I really don't think the Snyman one was worse.

Then you probably need to look at it again. I don't have a clip to hand, but there was clear contact between Snyman's shoulder and the tackled player's head, and probably also by the other SA tackler. The outcome wasn't terrible, but by the letter of the current interpretation that's a reckless tackle and a card.

Snyman s was definitely worse in respect to making contact to the head directly. Gardner waved it away as he said Kruis was ducking into it. Seen reds given and rescinded and vice versa. Don't think it's clear enough.

I don't think it was worse because the England guy dipped so low in the tackle he was almost on his knees which is mitigation for it being close to the head although in the video I have seen it isn't clear that there is contact with the head https://twitter.com/pommieP1/status/1059064292375445506. Secondly the tackle was not with quite the same force as Farrells tackle.

That link doesn't work. For me anyway.like I've said I've seen it punished both ways. It was direct to the head and he was low but I've also seen explanations saying players should be aware anyway. Still no arms and leading shoulder so punishable but same as.Farrell up for debate as to how much.

No 7&1/2 wrote:That link doesn't work. For me anyway.like I've said I've seen it punished both ways. It was direct to the head and he was low but I've also seen explanations saying players should be aware anyway. Still no arms and leading shoulder so punishable but same as.Farrell up for debate as to how much.

I agree that Snyman's was worth a penalty aswell. Just doesnt seem as clear cut nor as dangerous mainly because there wasn't the same amount of force. That's my only logic really.

https://twitter.com/pommieP1/status/1059064292375445506

Poorfour wrote:

To be clear: I agree. As a coach and ref myself, player safety is the highest priority and it angers me when a referee does not take it seriously. But in rugby the ref is the sole arbiter of the laws. It's also reasonable to make the point that saying "England would have lost if Gardner had refereed that tackle correctly" is taking too narrow a view, because there were plenty of tackles on both sides that were not refereed by the normal interpretation. If they had, it would have been a very different game.

.

I'm not really commenting on the result. I don't really care who wins. Maybe I favour England slightly but that's not the point.

The point is: It is one thing discussing incorrect refereeing decisions that may or may not have a material effect on the game (a backline offside for instance). It's a completely different ballgame to discuss foul play decisions not given. All of these should be made example of. That includes the head charge, the gouge and Farrell's tackle.

Imagine saying to a parent that has just seen his young boy get concussed in a dangerous tackle that was not given by the referee....."Well to be fair to the referee, he was consistent, he didn't give any of the other 9 dangerous tackles in the match".

Doesn't sit well with me.

And you can certainly see that Gardner is correct that Kruis 'ducks' into it. In reality though that duck is bracing himself ready for 17s challenge. Still pretty forceful for me and straight to the head. It's not been cited so I assume the officer agrees with you that it lacks power to do damage. For me that's a mistake and it's precisely the sort of challenge that the new harsher law and citing was trying to get rid of!
For clarity a mistake that they don't want to punish it not a mistake in not citing necessarily.

RugbyFan100 wrote:

Poorfour wrote:

To be clear: I agree. As a coach and ref myself, player safety is the highest priority and it angers me when a referee does not take it seriously. But in rugby the ref is the sole arbiter of the laws. It's also reasonable to make the point that saying "England would have lost if Gardner had refereed that tackle correctly" is taking too narrow a view, because there were plenty of tackles on both sides that were not refereed by the normal interpretation. If they had, it would have been a very different game.

.

I'm not really commenting on the result. I don't really care who wins. Maybe I favour England slightly but that's not the point.

The point is: It is one thing discussing incorrect refereeing decisions that may or may not have a material effect on the game (a backline offside for instance). It's a completely different ballgame to discuss foul play decisions not given. All of these should be made example of. That includes the head charge, the gouge and Farrell's tackle.

Imagine saying to a parent that has just seen his young boy get concussed in a dangerous tackle that was not given by the referee....."Well to be fair to the referee, he was consistent, he didn't give any of the other 9 dangerous tackles in the match".

Doesn't sit well with me.

As a parent and coach of a 13 year old and a 10 year old who play rugby (and a 7 year old - but she's still playing tag), it infuriates me when a ref does not police high tackles. So much so that in some tournaments I have discussed with my fellow coaches whether to withdraw the team, and had words with the tournament organisers to ask them to remind the refs. I've watched my son break five successive high tackles to score a try and been told by the ref "See? Do you still think I should have blown up earlier?" (Yes, sir, yes I do).

(Note: Poorfour Jr has a sui generis running style that tends to lead to high tackles, because he hunches over the ball and goes in to contact shoulder first. If the tackler's technique is poor, they will almost invariably "do a Snyman" and very few refs know how to handle it).

But Saturday's mistakes happened and it just seems to me the wrong answer to focus on one of them to the exclusion of others, when several of them could have changed the game.

Poorfour wrote:

But Saturday's mistakes happened and it just seems to me the wrong answer to focus on one of them to the exclusion of others, when several of them could have changed the game.

I completely agree. Focus on all of them. It was a shocking refereeing performance.

Good luck to Poorfour JNR by the way.

TBH - As a South African, my disappointment was less in the tackle not being awarded, and more in the fact that it went to the big screen and both the TV ref and the ref said "there's been an attempt to wrap his arms".
A) It's impossible to wrap with your lead arm when you are leading with the shoulder
B) The trailing arm doesn't touch Esterhuizen, until after initial contact, and even then, it basically caresses his arm as the poor Farrel careens off him, likely concussed by th force of the collision.

Also, C) I'm pretty sure there was a high tackle missed like 15 seconds before this.

Despite all this, we played so poorly that I wasn't too upset about the decision tbh. Until World Rugby backed the ref and imo basically legalised the shoulder charge, because there is no way that wasn't a shoulder charge.