I thought the ref had 3 absolutely critical decisions to make that game. (1) the Maitland yellow card, (2) the disallowed Aussie try, and (3) that penalty. I think he got (1) wrong, (2) right, (3) jury still out? I thought Aus were the better side overall and probably deserved the win.
But it wasn't offside. Wrong decision, end of. Scrum NOT penalty. As quoted on BBC. Referee Craig Joubert was wrong to award a crucial 78th-minute penalty against Scotland in Sunday's World Cup quarter-final defeat by Australia, says World Rugby. Scotland led 34-32 at Twickenham when Jon Welsh was ruled deliberately offside for playing the ball after a knock-on by a team-mate. The governing body said that, because Australia's Nick Phipps touched the ball, "the appropriate decision should have been a scrum to Australia for the original knock-on"
Regardless of the decision it was Scotland that lost the game, not the referee. To loose possession in your own half with a 100 or so seconds left is just criminal, they couldn't see the game out and paid the price. The referee has been well and truly shafted by his peers and governing body as well, he had a split second decision to make and he got it wrong, instead of support him they've just thrown him under the bus.
Agreed. The ref was hardly the only one that made a mistake in that passage of play. I feel for the Scots, but it'd be a shame if this tournament was remembered for one decision in one game, rather than the many parts of it that have been superb.
Completely agree. Ref's been hung out to dry by the authorities, that's shameful. OK, he got a decision wrong, probably realised straight away but was prevented by the rules from querying or reversing it. That's tough. Refs get decisions wrong from time to time, it's just unfortunate this one was so critical.
If you have TMO capability then why not use it fully, granted the referee gave the penalty for offside, an offence that can not be viewed via the TMO, but upon viewing the footage another offence is obvious then the referee should be able to change that decision otherwise like has happened in Jouberts' case he has been made a scapegoat. The rugby world cup is not going to remembered for this one bad decision, it has so far been a fantastic world cup with some great games, 4 more games to come and I'm sure we will still see some outstanding games, some class players on view and still some debatable decisions from the referees........but thats sport, who'd be a referee in any sport nowadays?
Balls stuck in slow-moving rucks and mauls too much in Euro games and then territory gained by kicking.. awful handling skills from forwards - too much time in the gym power-lifting, not enough on the pitch maybe.. Haskell being a prime example in the case of England - awful carrying the ball and on the breakdown when he played. Need to get Union learning a bit more from League, rather than knocking it and competing against it.. I'm not a league fan but can see aspects that are streets ahead. Lack of fitness in many of the Northern Hemisphere players - Bastaruead looked like he'd just stepped out a pub and had the same impact. Lack of strong international captains for England and France and odd management decisions - Michalak was found out on the international stage a decade ago, so why play him now? On the plus side, injuries blighted most Northern teams this WC so there was an element of bad luck. Interesting that Argentina now had 2 consecutive better WCs on 10% of the budget that England has.. indicates a lot of over-paid management and coaches not doing their jobs well enough. ESSEX GULL
So the Kiwis progress to the final next week. Just over 80,000 watched at Twickenham, South Africa led at half time 12-7 but the Kiwis ended up the victors 20-18.
The key reason for me is that Southern Hemisphere teams all have forwards who can actually play rugby. Watch New Zealand play and Dane Coles (their Hooker) is often the widest out player on the pitch. They can all run with the ball, have a step, and most importantly pass the ball well, particularly off-loads. In a typical game I imagine the All Blacks forwards make more off-loads than the backs of a Northern Hemisphere team. This makes the speed of attacks so much quicker and makes it so much harder to defend against.
Good game and great come back from Argentina. Australia ran out 29-15 winners. So to Friday for the 3rd and 4th position that's been played at Olympic Stadium, then on Saturday it's the final between New Zealand and Australia been played at Twickenham.
Have they got the bottle to ban McCaw, looking at this they should. http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/ru...land-captain-ahead-Rugby-World-Cup-final.html
