League must get to grips with bad refereeing

ON RUGBY:Brian O'Driscoll was right to highlight the gross inconsistencies and poor standards, writes GERRY THORNLEY

SO THEY meet again, and we do know where and we do know when. What had seemed like a potentially anti-climactic end-of-season run-in has been given an injection of interest, not only in ensuring the most meaningful meeting of the two Irish superpowers this season, but also ensuring one of them will be in the final in three weeks.

The Irish squad meet up after that league final for the Barbarians match and summer tour, and one wonders what the Irish management will make of it. Privately, they probably have mixed feelings. This clash will sharpen the waning competitive juices of the leading players amid their post-Heineken Cup semi-final hangover.

Against that, many of them have looked weary and are carrying injuries – even more so than normal come May at the end of a post-Lions season.

But the sight of their most familiar friends and foes, and a capacity 18,500 crowd, should reactivate the old juices.

The two games were sharply contrasting affairs: Munster did enough in a grim arm-wrestle with Cardiff, whereas Leinster won a typically madcap game of basketball against Edinburgh to ensure home advantage next weekend.

Brian O’Driscoll appeared to become noticeably more animated as the match progressed, and this continued afterwards. Not normally one to gift the media with his presence while on Leinster duty and on a break from his responsibilities as Irish captain, O’Driscoll gave vent to his view that Leinster should not countenance moving the semi-final to Croke Park and sacrifice the RDS as their home venue next week.

But clearly he was even more moved to vent his frustration over the performance of Peter Fitzgibbon, or, more pertinently, refereeing standards in general in the Magners League. O’Driscoll even went so far as to request that an elite referee such as Nigel Owens or Wayne Barnes be in charge of the semi-final. Presumably he was airing his view on the assumption that it is to be a non-Irish referee, for any one of Alain Rolland, Alan Lewis or George Clancy would be superior to any Scottish referee or one from Wales, apart from Owens.

The good news is that Owens will officiate the RDS semi-final, while Clancy will be in charge of the Friday semi-final in Wales between the Ospreys and Glasgow.

However, while O’Driscoll and many others will rest a little easier on that score, the greater issue of the standard of refereeing remains the league’s biggest problem.

In asking for someone of the ilk of Owens or Barnes, O’Driscoll explained: “They have international pedigree and their level of consistency is clear. Their explanations are there for you in the dressingroom beforehand, and they stick by them, whereas on occasion referees say one thing in a dressingroom and referee completely differently out on the pitch. That’s when you see guys losing the head and making throwaway remarks because of the level of frustration, and I’d be as guilty as anyone.”

O’Driscoll is not one to abuse his status as an eminence grise among modern-day players, which means we should all sit up and take notice when he is moved to speak.

Matt Williams, whose presence in the Setanta Sports studios has enlightened viewers and added to the channel’s coverage no end, has been carping on about this for years. It is, he says, the league’s elephant in the room.

Williams estimated that in seven of Ulster’s first 10 matches last season, the actual result was determined one way or the other by incorrect refereeing decisions. Williams was moved to write to the IRFU and the three refereeing co-ordinators from Ireland, Wales and Scotland. He implored them to introduce a merit-based system with referees ranked accordingly, rather than one based on nationality, which has largely been the case in the league’s history.

The ERC have done this in appointing Donal Courtney as their referees’ performance manager, and perhaps in time this will filter down to the league, although they could do worse than either appoint him as well or someone else with a similar remit.

Of course, there is a mini crisis in refereeing throughout the game internationally, even though it appears the Magners League is the worst example, with professional livelihoods and the entertainment value of the sport – which is, after all, an industry – significantly affected.

The Scots have given the world plenty of good referees in the past – Jim Fleming, Brian Anderson, Alan Hosie and others – but simply aren’t producing them at the moment.

This is not an exclusively Scottish problem, and nor is it about where referees are born. This is about refereeing standards. If it comes to pass in a few years that 80 per dent of the best referees in the Celtic unions are Scottish, so be it; but as long as the league divvies up the refereeing appointments on a geographical basis, the problem will remain.

The way referees are appointed, assessed and employed simply hasn’t kept pace with modern professional sport, rugby included. By contrast, though, other sports have changed hugely.

For example, the Super League (rugby league) in Britain are bringing over young referees from other countries such as New Zealand and Australia on full-time contracts.

The IRB and the league need to start thinking outside the box. Peter Marshall, the former club player and Australian international referee, now runs the training courses in Australia for cricket umpires. Australian Rugby League now has an ex-player, Mick Stone, as their referees’ chief, and he has referees looking at the game through players’ eyes.

Of course, for all the money that has come into the game, there has not been compelling evidence that professional referees are better than semi-professional ones, but nor is it sufficiently financially remunerative, or long-term enough, to attract the best.

Admittedly, the league has begun employing non-neutral referees this season (ie, non-Scottish for Irish-Welsh games), and have begun exchanging referees with their English and French counterparts this season (and an English referee has been pencilled in for the final).

But the trade-off means losing the league’s best to games in the Top 14 and the Premiership, and besides which the elite European referees – who will officiate in the Southern Hemisphere this season – cannot be employed every week.

Furthermore, the advent of two Italian teams to the league – and their referees! – means the number of matches in the league will increase from 90 to 132.

Ye Gods.