Rassie verdict is in.

First topic message reminder :

Just seen the verdict for Rassie’s misdeeds re his video. Guilty of six charges. Two month ban from all rugby and a 10 month match day ban, starting immediately. Plus a £20000 fine and both SAR and Rassie have been given the waggy finger about future conduct.
Where I’m from, that would be regarded as a full swing in the man veg.

World rugby sending out a message?

Cool so from the list you gave initially the only change you'd have is defenders are allowed off their feet and attackers aren't?

No 7&1/2 wrote:

Old Man wrote:

No 7&1/2 wrote:

Old Man wrote:

No 7&1/2 wrote:

Old Man wrote:

No 7&1/2 wrote:

lostinwales wrote:https://www.theoffsideline.com/gregor-townsend-rassie-erasmus/

Hmmm. He obviously has his talents, but it looks like he has form for bad behaviour with referees and opposition players.

They do need to ban water carriers from the actual teams and bring in technical areas where coaches and the like aren't allowed out of. Be it idiots saying Jamie George likes a good feed, or kicking away balls, or telling people lineout calls. Unfortunately if you give some people leeway they will take advantage and make restrictions on everyone necessary.

That is hilarious, and to be very honest pathetic to complain about.

Firstly, character assassination

It is in the law to have two staff members sideline. Usually waterboys or physios.

Rassie motioned to Willie and communicated to Willie he should target the wing because he is kak (shyte) under the high ball.

It WR does not want waterboys, physios or any staff next to the field they need to change the law, but then add another 15 minutes to the process if waterboys or physios or medics need to come onto the field.

As for staff sideline communicating with players, it happens all the time, in every match with every team

In terms of water carriers overstepping their roles and becoming embroiled in the game you mean? Don't think slowing the game down by kicking balls away and offering coaching are the best things for them to be doing. I know some like to turn this into American Football style resets and coaching during breaks but personally I'd like to see shorter breaks in play. It's ok to at home as you can see replays etc but it's a slog when you're in the ground.

I don't like unnecessary breaks either, the Lions series was atrocious from that point of view. However the perception created there has improved by a good margin since then. Supporters look at SA as they did that in the Lions tour, but now it has become a common perception to say it is only SA that does it, which to anyone opening their other eye is untrue

Even though I gave 2 examples which were from Premiership games? May I suggest that not everyone is out to get you!

I got that

Been spending a lot of time on an Aussie site, we aren't popular there.

lol. Last time I looked on some of their sites was prior then post the 2016 England tour. Was amusing as they went from expecting a 3 match white wash to deserting the board after a 3 0 reverse.

They spoke about that a lot last week prior to the test vs England.

One thing about Aussies, they build their expectations very quickly and become depressed the moment after.

Their wins over SA was lauded as the big comeback, When they started the European tour they were confident.

I reminded them they have been playing at home for two seasons and travelling abroad with some key injuries would be much tougher.

No 7&1/2 wrote:Cool so from the list you gave initially the only change you'd have is defenders are allowed off their feet and attackers aren't?

No, I said everyone stay on their feet.

Attacking team.

Ball carrier must release
Players stay on their feet
Come from an onside position
Don't clear beyond the ruck.


Defending team.
Stay on feet
Come from an onside position
Only first arrival has rights to the ball

Onside line for both teams is hind most feet.

Old Man wrote:

No 7&1/2 wrote:Cool so from the list you gave initially the only change you'd have is defenders are allowed off their feet and attackers aren't?

No, I said everyone stay on their feet.

Ah sorry misunderstood that. From my reading of that then Old Man (and I may be wrong and not seeing it so tell me), there isn't one law that you've actually proposed to change from the list you gave initially. The main point would be about refs only pinging what they see as relevant; which is basically what everyone would like to see....but I think we all see the breakdown as we like to see it and not as a general consensus! My overall thought is brought back around again, we all like watching rugby, we don't agree with all decisions but they can all broadly be backed by someone (or at least you can see why they were given).

No 7&1/2 wrote:

Old Man wrote:

No 7&1/2 wrote:Cool so from the list you gave initially the only change you'd have is defenders are allowed off their feet and attackers aren't?

No, I said everyone stay on their feet.

Ah sorry misunderstood that. From my reading of that then Old Man (and I may be wrong and not seeing it so tell me), there isn't one law that you've actually proposed to change from the list you gave initially. The main point would be about refs only pinging what they see as relevant; which is basically what everyone would like to see....but I think we all see the breakdown as we like to see it and not as a general consensus! My overall thought is brought back around again, we all like watching rugby, we don't agree with all decisions but they can all broadly be backed by someone (or at least you can see why they were given).

Like I said, I am not the expert and certainly won't be able to provide you with law changes in ten minutes.

It is something that needs assessment and consideration which nobody is going to achieve in a day

I agree whole heartedly in that it's complicated. But I think it demonstrates that when you think about it each part of those multiple decisions in 3 seconds does need to be there else you radically alter the game, and not necessarily for the better. One thing I do keep seeing from commentators of a certain vintage is that the law makers should get rid of the jackal which from my reading would be you can only use your hands once your own set of players are ahead of the ball ie for want of a better way of putting it bring back being able to rake your studs on people. Can't see the optics of that ever allowing it to come back though! (and its mentioned alot by ex fly half Stuart Barnes who probably knows less about a ruck than most).

Well they need to find a way for the referee to have to watch less areas of the ruck, even if they just find a way to simplify each law. How is the challenge. Maybe it is time for two referees on the field.

As a ref who has recently stepped up to reffing Colts games (i.e. full adult game with adult sized players and only a limit on how far the scrum moves), I am ever more aware that at any breakdown you could penalise either side for half a dozen things and not be wrong.

What you are taught to do on the reffing course is to make a quick judgement about what's material in any situation. The big ones are the sequence of tackler releasing, ball carrier placing the ball, everyone at least making an effort to enter from behind the back feet and stay upright, and only players who aren't bound in can place hands on the ball (i.e. first man and the scrum half once it's been won). If those are happening OK, you can be tolerant of a lot else unless it's giving one side a consistent unfair advantage - if I see something i don't like but not clearly enough to blow, I will warn the offending team and then blow the next time.

It's not perfect, and sometimes you see too many things going on to be able to make a good call. In that case the best I can do is usually to decide if the attacking side got a fair chance to recycle and then either play on or reset with a scrum depending on what's happening. Not ideal, but it keeps the game moving and avoids random guessing.

For me, the point about Rassie's video was that he made it public and it put unreasonable pressure on Nic Berry as a human being and on the refereeing team as a whole. It went a long way beyond things that other coaches have been fined and banned for, especially in terms of its impact.

The fact that Berry had the decency to review it and only conceded on fewer than half of the points (including graciously owning up to the couple of really bad calls) suggests that overall he actually did a good job. The Lions could have compiled a list every bit as long (and maybe they did) and got a similar response. The key is whether Berry's calls were justified in the context of the game and the vast majority of them were. In real time, he saw different things as important and made his calls on that basis as he is entitled to do.

I like to have a good moan about the ref as much as anyone, and I fervently believe that if I politely but loudly offer advice from the sidelines, or sometimes even from a sofa half way across the world and two hours after the match was played, I can assist him or her in making better decisions.

And I don't actually mind that from players or spectators when I ref, as long as it it polite - it helps me to know what else to look out for. A player suffered a concussion in one of my recent matches but play had moved on and I could not see that he was struggling to get up because he was behind me. It was the shouts from the crowd that alerted me to needing to stop play, though I would have preferred "Injured player, sir!"! to "For *&$£'s sake, ref!" - I don't have eyes in the back of my head, and the former is much more informative.

But once the game is over, it's incumbent on everyone to bite their tongues and follow due process. Coaches should be limiting themselves to "There were some decisions that we didn't understand and we'll ask for clarification" and putting their feedback in through the channels.

My understanding from Meet the Ref evenings with Wayne Barnes is that even for the top refs the feedback process could be improved - the feedback generally goes to the assessors, and a lot of it is filtered out before it comes back to the ref. I also believe that unless there's a factually incorrect call, most of the feedback focuses on game management - the reffing hierarchy knows that it's a question of interpretation and there is almost always a good justification for each decision, however disappointed one side or the other is. (As part of that we also had Wayne show a clip where he carded a Quins player completely incorrectly - which he admitted but also said "I didn't see all of what happened in real time but from what I did see the card was the right decision" - this was when TMO involvement was much more restricted).

My sense is that it's actually in the pre-meetings and ref briefings that they fine tune the way decisions are made - given the number of judgement calls in any given match, it's managing the collective direction of travel that matters much more than forensically interpreting any one incident, with the possible exception of serious card offences.

By the way, for anyone who's interested I'd strongly recommend the short, not very expensive book below:

Better Rugby Refereeing

It's by Derek Robinson, an author and amateur ref, and Ed Morrison, who in his day was one of the top international refs. They were friends from early in their respective careers, and the book is in the form of a conversation about how to manage a game better.

The technical details have moved on since they were active in the game - but the principles remain the same and I think about it a lot in the context of my own reffing.

Thanks pourfour.

One question, and I think I know the answer already.

Do you not think transparency will go a long way to subdue discontent?

in other words if there is more openness and honesty in regards to mistakes the public will have better awareness of how things were interpeted, rightly or wrongly.

Old Man wrote:Thanks pourfour.

One question, and I think I know the answer already.

Do you not think transparency will go a long way to subdue discontent?

in other words if there is more openness and honesty in regards to mistakes the public will have better awareness of how things were interpeted, rightly or wrongly.

I'm unconvinced about transparency. The big danger of greater transparency is that it legitimises criticism of individual refs rather than the overall system, and that then starts to erode the boundaries we have that mean players and coaches do not directly criticise the ref. The end point of that is that we reach a football-like situation where we have to pay refs at all levels to do their job, and abuse on the field is rife. (as an aside, I'd have loved to see Nigel Owens take on a top flight soccer match, but with rugby's authority to move the ball 10 yards down the pitch for dissent...).

What would be good would be more transparent feedback at an aggregate level - e.g. "over x international matches, coaches raised y points of feedback, the consistent themes were z and these are the interpretation changes we are making as a result".

The truth is that it is very rare that a game is decided by the ref in rugby.

From an England perspective, I can remember two or three. The one that sticks in the mind was Wales v England in Cardiff in 2013 where Steve Walsh's interpretation of the scrum was so awful (he allowed Adam Jones to consistently bind on the end of the sleeve and then repeatedly penalised Marler when Jones yanked his bind loose) that it had a material outcome on the scoreline (and so the destination of the 6N trophy) but probably not the result. Nige made an absolute howler in Scotland v England 2018, allowing a Scottish jackaller to enter the ruck from the wrong side and penalising Owen Farrell for holding on. That swung the entire momentum of the game at a point where England were getting back into it. And Marius Jonker's intervention in England v ABs in 2018 looked at the wrong thing - Lawes's foot was definitely ahead of his team mates' but there was no discussion of whether it was ahead of the back foot of the ruck (I am not at all sure it was).

Two of those could have changed the outcome of the game; only the last definitely did (and he had a bloody good go at it in the semi final too - getting one of them badly wrong).

Would it have helped to have public criticism of those officials? I don't think so. What's done is done. What's important is what the refs do next, and since it's very rare for one ref to handle two games for the same team, the more important factor is how the team is briefed. Having those calls subject to greater scrutiny by bar room refs (even qualified ones like me)

I remember the 2013 Wales vs England game, score was something like 30-3.

I remember that scrum advantage well.

Most significant match influenced by a referee in a match was Australia vs SA in 2011 World Cup. Bryce Lawrence.

I actually wrote a conspiracy piece on that and the site I wrote it on (an Aussie one) refused to publish it, they didn't even want to justify why.

I'd say that all those games as an England fan annoyed me alot Poorfour but I don't think the ref decided any of those games either. It's so easy to fall into say ah if Underhills try had stood we win by x number of points. It does kinda ignore all the other mistakes throughout the entire game that held influence though.

That Lawes one was bloody annoying though. After the 20th time of viewing I was shouting at the tv it has to be clear and obvious and it' blatently not if you have to watch this many times!

Delighted they have thrown the book at him, but frustrating it took so long.

The video was an embarrassment to rugby as a whole.

That Wales England game - I remember that Walsh also stopped talking to England. All credit to Adam Jones for exploiting the situation but It was a terrible performance by Walsh

EST wrote:Delighted they have thrown the book at him, but frustrating it took so long.

The video was an embarrassment to rugby as a whole.

Wasn't really a book was it?

More a pamphlet.

Old Man wrote:

EST wrote:Delighted they have thrown the book at him, but frustrating it took so long.

The video was an embarrassment to rugby as a whole.

Wasn't really a book was it?

More a pamphlet.

More of a promise of a hardback should he do it again.

Old Man wrote:I remember the 2013 Wales vs England game, score was something like 30-3.

I remember that scrum advantage well.

Most significant match influenced by a referee in a match was Australia vs SA in 2011 World Cup. Bryce Lawrence.

I actually wrote a conspiracy piece on that and the site I wrote it on (an Aussie one) refused to publish it, they didn't even want to justify why.

I remember that Wales-England match. Wales were clearly the better team, but Steve Walsh was a disaster of a ref from an England point of view, as he usually was. I am not sure if we already knew the personal issues Walsh was dealing with at that time, but he was clearly someone who should never have been in the international arena.

If I remember, that Wallaby-Bok match was very low score? Or am I thinking of a different match? If I have it right, the Boks had all the possession, but Pocock had a fantastic match. Lots of questionable, generally one way calls at the breakdown.

Yes, Wallabies won 11-9

David Pocock was blown to pieces against Ireland in the pool match by Bryce Lawrence, and then in the QF he was given free reign, whether offside, on the ground it just didn't matter.

John Smit and Victor Matfield tried to find out from Bryce why Pocock had free reign and he just waved them away, a try we scored was called forward, without any evidence and he refused to look at the TMO, and Burger was going to score a try and Pocock from offside of the ruck laid hands on the ball and was given a penalty.

SA had a tad under 70% possession and territory n the match and by memory we only gained four penalties in the whole match.

Lawrence after the match conceded he froze, but it didn't matter we were out of the RWC

https://youtu.be/Gefv6PzR1c8

1.01 for that forward pass. Which is forward. Just to confirm my previous point on being too hung up on certain decisions, give it a rewind to the SA scrum and tell me if that's fairly fed and not straight to the SA 2nd row.

https://www.espn.com/rugby/matchstats?gameId=93500&league=164205

Re pens. Australia conceded more. But then match stats do not record advantages played on pens.

OZ conceded one more penalty than SA, spending most of the match in their half and plenty of time in their 22. Not going rwatch that match ever again to search for the moments Lawrence was asleep or frozen according to him, He was influenced by the pressure ARU put on him after the Ireland match and there was no way he was going to cop that again.

Old Man wrote:OZ conceded one more penalty than SA, spending most of the match in their half and plenty of time in their 22. Not going rwatch that match ever again to search for the moments Lawrence was asleep or frozen according to him, He was influenced by the pressure ARU put on him after the Ireland match and there was no way he was going to cop that again.

And I'll probably never watch that 2013 Wales match again! Just goes to show that things can become legend and scorched into memory....and are false.

Which I think supports my argument. That we can each remember a couple of really egregious examples rather than loads of them suggests that most of the time the refs are getting it broadly right.

And the Lawrence example suggests that pressure on refs from unions is a bad idea.

Old Man wrote:Yes, Wallabies won 11-9

David Pocock was blown to pieces against Ireland in the pool match by Bryce Lawrence, and then in the QF he was given free reign, whether offside, on the ground it just didn't matter.

John Smit and Victor Matfield tried to find out from Bryce why Pocock had free reign and he just waved them away, a try we scored was called forward, without any evidence and he refused to look at the TMO, and Burger was going to score a try and Pocock from offside of the ruck laid hands on the ball and was given a penalty.

SA had a tad under 70% possession and territory n the match and by memory we only gained four penalties in the whole match.

Lawrence after the match conceded he froze, but it didn't matter we were out of the RWC

Thanks for reminding me.  Sometimes it takes a reminder to get my remaining brain cells working.  

Really tight match and thought the Boks took a thorough screwing.  Didn’t remember if Pocock got away with a lot or was just really good.  But I do remember thinking the Boks should have won handily and most of the decisions which went against the Boks were generally in Wallaby territory.

Old Man wrote:...Most significant match influenced by a referee in a match was Australia vs SA in 2011 World Cup. Bryce Lawrence...

While Springbok fans might think that, there are plenty of other candidates for the title. Six days later, the Welsh captain was red-carded against France. Certainly, it was a poor performance by Lawrence, and it robbed us of a fascinating semi-final clash between South Africa and New Zealand.

Still, even if you limit nominations to World Cup matches, then Craig Joubert's match-turning penalty award to Australia against Scotland in 2015 would beat your 2011 quarter final, because World Rugby threw the ref under the bus after the match, and said he was wrong. For all that supporters might believe themselves to be robbed, this match is the only one to be officially endorsed as a robbery.

If England had lost the 2003 World Cup final, then Andre Watson's refereeing of the scrum would easily rank alongside Lawrence's view of the 2011 breakdown. Everyone knew Australia had no scrum, while, just a few months earlier, England had defended their goal line with a six man scrum against NZ. And yet Watson kept penalizing England, which kept Australia in that game. Still, England escaped with a win. Cueto's disallowed try in the 2007 World Cup is still a sore point. The main reason it doesn't keep too many fans awake at night, is because we probably don't feel we deserved to win.

Aside from Scotland, the All Blacks still feel robbed by Wayne Barnes in 2007, while French fans feel aggrieved by the refereeing of the 2011 World Cup final. They are similar matches, in that the officials largely decided to stop awarding penalties in the last half hour.

The French had another reason to feel hard done by officaldom in 1995. Perhaps South African supporters might remember:

Good examples rugby fan, all worthy candidates, the reason the 2011 QF stands out for me was because it wasn't one decision that made a difference, it was a 80 minute poor performance, SA was just not going to get the rub of the green.

I was in the stadium for Cueto’s disallowed try, directly in line and only about ten rows from the pitch. Much as I would have liked him to score, it wasn’t a try.

The Joubert incident is a good example. Definitely the wrong call when you have all the evidence, but IIRC Joubert followed the TMO protocol in place at the time and couldn’t overturn his own decision even though the screen was showing the error. The issue was more the protocol than the ref (though Barnes or Owens might have changed the protocol on the fly). Hanging Joubert out to dry helped nobody, least of all him.

Likewise, Warburton’s red was technically the correct decision, though a yellow would have been more sympathetic to the game.

Watson in 2003 I’ll give you, though England were eventually able to nullify it by doing what they should have done much earlier and putting Jason Leonard on (“I’ll just go straight forward and back shall I sir?”). It also gave rise to one of my favourite rugby quotes. Watson had told Johnson and the front row in his briefing that “If I can’t bet my house on it, I won’t blow” leading Steve Thompson to declare - just loudly enough to be sure of being heard, just quietly enough to be able to deny it - “Andre, mate. This house of yours must be a Frak Poopie.”

Firstly, I can see why the SA's like Rassie. He's turned around SA rugby, winning the WC and a Lions series. He's built an "us and them" attitude which people really buy into, but.......

Having finally had a bit of time to go through the report.....the guy is either pretty dumb....or an absolute loop.

To suggest he was acting on his own personal behalf...the coach of SA people, talking about a SA game....sat in full SA kit....????

To suggest he didn't want it to go public by sending it out to 40/50 people.

This is even without going into how utterly awful the actual video was....by a national coach!

Just to top everything off, he's then contested the decision! I really hope he has his quite lenient ban extended by a decent amount.

He really comes across as a quite awful bloke.

Think I'm a bit late to the party on this one.

Credit where its due as him and the union have both now accepted the wrong doing and apologised.

Sgt_Pooly wrote:...Having finally had a bit of time to go through the report.....the guy is either pretty dumb....or an absolute loop...

I've heard a few people say that he seemed a bit unhinged.

Ooh, we're getting an Erasmus document on these events from SA's perspective. No news on whether it gets as far as him finding the world's tiniest violin or not.

It will be a string quartet

South Africa will no longer be known as the Springboks, they will be the Perennial Hard Done-by'ers.

The joke of it all is Berry was harshly criticised for his officiating of the Super Rugby Australia final, his reputation amongst many Australians was not good.

Hour-long discussion of the case from a sports law perspective. Includes input from Steve Diamond and the BBC's Chris Jones. This was conducted before the appeal was dropped.

Poorfour wrote:
Watson in 2003 I’ll give you, though England were eventually able to nullify it by doing what they should have done much earlier and putting Jason Leonard on (“I’ll just go straight forward and back shall I sir?”). It also gave rise to one of my favourite rugby quotes. Watson had told Johnson and the front row in his briefing that “If I can’t bet my house on it, I won’t blow” leading Steve Thompson to declare - just loudly enough to be sure of being heard, just quietly enough to be able to deny it - “Andre, mate. This house of yours must be a Frak Poopie.”

Great quote, although I think it was actually Austen Healy that said it?

Old Man wrote:The joke of it all is Berry was harshly criticised for his officiating of the Super Rugby Australia final, his reputation amongst many Australians was not good.

I don't see that of any relevance Old Man. The issue here is Erasmus and his attitude/mental state.....

Sgt_Pooly wrote:

Old Man wrote:The joke of it all is Berry was harshly criticised for his officiating of the Super Rugby Australia final, his reputation amongst many Australians was not good.

I don't see that of any relevance Old Man. The issue here is Erasmus and his attitude/mental state.....

The relevance is Berry isn't a great referee. If Rassie didn't go to the extreme his criticism through the right channels might have carried more weight.

As for questioning Rassie's mental state, I think that is going too far, question his motives by all means, why bring mental state into it?

Berry could be the worst referee to ever ref a game.....what Erasmus did was massively out of line, way way over the top and rightly actioned against.

As it is, Berry was completely fine in that game. Yea he missed some things, as do all referees every game.

No argument there, and Rassie is rightfully being punished for it. His actions though doesn't make him mental, nor take away from the fact that Berry was controversially viewed in his own country even before the Lions series.

Which is just whataboutery designed to detract from Erasmus' actions.

Nah, nothing whataboutery about it.

Berry was fine. Mental state doesn't mean he has a mental illness either, merely what he's thinking/aiming for. For me he appears to be quite successfully rallying his base (almost Trump style). Throws a dead cat on the table and then brings together a its us vs them thing. In that respect his aim is no different to a shed load of sports coaches and managers. His overstepping of the mark is to aim his vitriol at a guy/set of officials simply doing their jobs to an extent where you see SA fans swallowing it hook, line and sinker. It was good to see him climb down with his apology but I am intrigued by what this doc will do. Seen plenty of people double down on things they know aren't true to make a quick quid.

Old Man wrote:

Sgt_Pooly wrote:

Old Man wrote:The joke of it all is Berry was harshly criticised for his officiating of the Super Rugby Australia final, his reputation amongst many Australians was not good.

I don't see that of any relevance Old Man. The issue here is Erasmus and his attitude/mental state.....

The relevance is Berry isn't a great referee. If Rassie didn't go to the extreme his criticism through the right channels might have carried more weight.

As for questioning Rassie's mental state, I think that is going too far, question his motives by all means, why bring mental state into it?

Because what he did was mental. World Rugby have gone easy on him.

Realistically what he did was impact the remaining games, fortunately for him we can't quantify how much impact or it's feasible the games would be become void.

I really liked what Erasmus did with SA but I have zero respect for the guy now, I don't think he should be allowed to be involved in International rugby again. He's really got away with it.

Well, this is a UK site, so the narrative is written by UK citizens, nothing I say is going to matter one iota.

So I will leave it there.

And the problem is just that Old Man. There are loads of SA fans who just blindly nod along simply because he's your main water carrier.

So many SA fans looking forward to the documentary too, where Rassie tells everyone about how he was right. Used to like the guy, and never had any issues with their fans. Can't stand any of them now.