Pro 12 Referees

interesting article by Alan Quinlan

http://www.irishtimes.com/sport/rugby/isolation-of-travelling-referees-gives-pro-12-amateurish-image-1.1785653

Pat Lam mentioned something similar, a few weeks back.

Basically currently each Union looks after its own referees, and feedback provided by a team in one Union doesn't seam to reach the referee of a game if he was from a different Union.

Lam has stated that the League needs to have a central referee body, that looks after the referees from each union, assigns the games and provides the feedback to them, and overall is more professional that the system we have now.

Quinlan goes further saying that the current method of having the referee being from the away teams union with the assistants provided by the home union isn't working out the best either.

He advocates that the referees be assigned together in units of four (one from each union) who then take it in rotation to ref a game and act as assistants.


Personally I think that this league has to get more serious and be taken more serious by fans and one way of doing this is by making sure the refereeing in consistent and professional.

For the start of next season I would like to see a Central body created that deals with the referees, makes sure they get bigger games if doing well, and smaller games or dropped if not, feedback is submitted to the Central body who feeds it back to the ref's.
Each union assigns referee's and their progress is left to the central body to access them and improve them.
Citing after games is left to 4th ref, rather than if the other team submits a complaint.
Have a number of groups formed, Four referees are assigned to a group (one from each union, and if there are not enough Scot, Italians, a couple of groups with 2 Welsh, 2 Irish), taking it in turn to ref, and assist, every 4-8 games break the groups up and form different partnerships.

Disciplinary hearings to be taken away from the union and assigned to this Central body as well.

I'd like to see these all brought in, in time for next season, are there any other improvements that you can think of to make to improve the league?

I think a central referee body is a must. There has been too many home town decisions all season. The Italian TMOs for example have given some outrageous decisions this season and the others are not much better.

Super rugby is similar. At the start of the season they had a few howler performances but they solved that by dropping some of the refs and since then the others have been more consistent.

I prefer any ref in the rabo than Garces the farce or Romain "policeman" Poite, thanks.

TMO needs to be sorted or scrapped though.

Interesting. This is all about accountability for me. Terrifying that critiques don't make it back to referees. No reason whatsoever why that shouldn't happen if feedback is made through the correct channels. What is key for me is that I have no idea of the processes through which referees can get hauled up in front of their peers and regulators for poor performances. Who holds them accountable, to what criteria and what are the sanctions if referees have been found to be negligent?

A lot of inconsistencies amongst the referees in the league and whilst everyone is only human, I have to admit that my heart sinks when Clownshoes or the Gibbon are listed on the Glasgow or Edinburgh match sheets.

I actually rate Poite highly. I like a ref who understands the scrum.

The worst refs for me are/were: Clancy Clownshoes, Alan Lewis and Chris Pillock.

Dreadful refs with precious little understanding of the game.

Joubert is annoying because he is extremely fussy, but at least he has a good grasp of the rules, albeit he could do with letting the game flow a bit more.

For a supposedly professional league refereeing standards are appalling with very few reasonably close encounters not hinging on a poor refereeing decision. This is simply not acceptable, the comments by Pat Lam show just how amateurish the set up is.

Clownshoes, Fitzgibbon and Hodges are all bloody hopeless.   The French guy who reffed Glasgow Edinburgh 2 weeks ago was an idiot also.

funnyExiledScot wrote:I actually rate Poite highly. I like a ref who understands the scrum.

The worst refs for me are/were: Clancy Clownshoes, Alan Lewis and Chris Pillock.

Dreadful refs with precious little understanding of the game.

Joubert is annoying because he is extremely fussy, but at least he has a good grasp of the rules, albeit he could do with letting the game flow a bit more.

The man hasn't the foggiest idea whats happening in the scrums. If a team goes forward he'll give them everything.

The best ref i have seen at scrum time is the Italian Mitrea (or is he Romanian?), he really knows his stuff.

Mitrea has improved beyond recongnition this season! He's actually pretty reliable now.

Yeah Mitrea has been good. Very consistent and is not far off taking charge of international matches.

Isn't there already a Pro12 citing commission 'independent' of the unions?

Courts hearing was in Cardiff. Or is it just a case of facing a citing commission run by a different union than your own?

Golden wrote:Isn't there already a Pro12 citing commission 'independent' of the unions?

Courts hearing was in Cardiff. Or is it just a case of facing a citing commission run by a different union than your own?

They have that alright. It used to be each union disciplining their own.

Inconsistency at its finest from Garces the farce tonight:
In the first case, he penalises a racing player for retaliation after being tackled (strangled even..) off the ball.
In the second case he even said that was the same case as the one previously mentionned, Racing 7 tackles Tolofua without the ball, Tolofua retaliates and kick him with his boot on the head (thankfully Racing 7 had a scrum cap..), guess who get penalised? yep Racing for 1st offence, tackling a player off the ball. Thankfully this time it didn't have any bearing on the result.

One of the worst referee at "top" level i have ever seen.

Games where Garces is the ref tend to be painful to watch but like you said he's one of our top refs so imagine what we have to put with every week.

VinceWLB wrote:Inconsistency at its finest from Garces the farce tonight:
In the first case, he penalises a racing player for retaliation after being tackled (strangled even..) off the ball.
In the second case he even said that was the same case as the one previously mentionned, Racing 7 tackles Tolofua without the ball, Tolofua retaliates and kick him with his boot on the head (thankfully Racing 7 had a scrum cap..), guess who get penalised? yep Racing for 1st offence, tackling a player off the ball. Thankfully this time it didn't have any bearing on the result.

One of the worst referee at "top" level i have ever seen.

Sorry vince complete b...lix. Leroux was a complete idiot and didnt give Garces much options...try again.

I thought Garces was fairly consistent tonight....

ME-109 wrote:

VinceWLB wrote:Inconsistency at its finest from Garces the farce tonight:
In the first case, he penalises a racing player for retaliation after being tackled (strangled even..) off the ball.
In the second case he even said that was the same case as the one previously mentionned, Racing 7 tackles Tolofua without the ball, Tolofua retaliates and kick him with his boot on the head (thankfully Racing 7 had a scrum cap..), guess who get penalised? yep Racing for 1st offence, tackling a player off the ball. Thankfully this time it didn't have any bearing on the result.

One of the worst referee at "top" level i have ever seen.

Sorry vince complete b...lix. Leroux was a complete idiot and didnt give Garces much options...try again.

Then in the 1st case it was ok for Nyanga to strangle Leroux off the ball?

Thats debatable...leroux started punching though...more obvious. Garces can only ref what he sees.

Thought the second one was more possible to go Racings way but again Leroux tackled yer man first without the ball...was a bit of an idiot all night really.

But he was inconsistent he said it was the same situation and yet there was 2 different outcomes. Either you penalise the 1st offence or the retaliation but do it for each case.

Leroux reminds me a bit of McCaw, a pain in the ass, really.

Maybe, but in the second case the contact with the boot was inconsequential and could be seen as a reflex. Both cases were down to leroux being a dope...in the first instance it is debatable that he was being choked whether you think it or not.

Sorry but not great example of Garces being poor. In fact he was pretty good tonight.

Seems only fair to give the Guvnor a word here:



Very interesting to hear him say that he regularly makes mistakes and that on the few occasions where he let the game get out of control, he's let the players down. I like it when Owens referees Welsh pro games because he just calls everyone on the pitch by their first names. "Adam - come here - you know exactly what you did".

It's obviously completely subjective but IMHO he is the best in the world at the moment. I saw an interview with Richie McCaw where he said that he likes being reffed by Owens as he knows exactly where he is with him at all times.