Cardiff Blues coach John Mulvihill believes his team were hard done by over two key decisions in Cardiff Blues 23-26 Ospreys: Sam Davies snatches Judgement Day win and Euro-play-off after Gareth Anscombe miss
The Aussie feels they should have been awarded a penalty try when Dan Evans was yellow carded for a deliberate knock on 11 minutes from time.
Evans’ one-handed intervention prevented Rey Lee Lo’s pass reaching Tomos Williams, with the sides level at 23-23 at the Principality Stadium.
And Mulvihill believes scrum-half Williams would have run in to score a likely match-winning try if the ball had reached him.
After consulting with his TMO Ian Davies, referee Nigel Owens decided the incident merited a penalty rather than a penalty try.
As it turned out, Gareth Anscombe missed the resulting kick at goal, with Sam Davies making no mistake a minute from time to snatch a 26-23 victory which sends the Ospreys through to a Champions Cup play-off at home to the Scarlets on the weekend of May 18.
Commenting on the contentious Dan Evans episode, Mulvihill said: “I thought it was going to be a penalty try.
“I thought Nigel was going to award it, but there was obviously a lot of talk in his ear from the TMOs and the touch judges.
“We clearly had three players in and around the ball and their nearest player was George North who was 15 metres that way and their other winger was 15 metres the other way and Tomos had about 25 metres to run, so that’s disappointing for us.”
Mulvihill was also unhappy that Tomos Williams’ 52nd minute try was disallowed for obstruction by Nick Williams on Owen Watkin in the build-up.
“The ball had already gone past and their player just dived to the ground. It did not look good,” he said.
“If you go to the letter of the law, there’s obstruction, but the obstruction didn’t lead to that tackler missing the tackle because he was miles away from it.”
The Ospreys-bound Anscombe had landed all five shots at goal, to add to his excellent early try, ahead of his late miss.
Asked how the Wales fly-half was feeling, Mulvihill said: “He is disappointed that he missed one.
“Sam Davies missed a couple of kicks as well, so it didn’t come down to that at all.
“Gareth was more concerned about Tomos running 20 metres to score a try with no one within 15 metres of him and why it was pulled back.”
Responding to Mulvihill’s comments on the Evans incident, Ospreys coach Allen Clarke said: “I am sure that’s up there for debate, that’s why it went to the TMO.
“But George North was covering back and he’s no slouch.
“You look at it through the colour of the lens that you support.
“It’s understandable for people to be aggrieved. We would have been aggrieved.”
He added: “We are chuffed with the performance overall.
“Quality and mentality won us that game, particularly in the second half when we played 20 minutes of it with 14 men.
“That tells you a lot about the group as a whole. It was a massive shift from the boys on the field and I thought our tight five were magnificent.”
