The World Cup is descending into reffing hell. Various coaches have taken aim, from Japan’s assistant Tony Brown to Ireland’s Joe Schmidt, much to the disgust of New Zealand’s Steve Hansen, who has called for a period of silence.
It is advice Michael Cheika is unlikely to take after one of his players received a three-match ban for a high tackle against Fiji that when repeated by Wales’s Rhys Patchell during Sunday’s victory over Australia, earned him a penalty.
Cheika almost appeared lost for words when asked for his thoughts on the penalty conceded by his centre Sami Kerevi who, to avoid his head crashing into Patchell’s shoulder, raised his left arm and cushioned the impact by making contact with the outside-half’s chest. The force of the collision forced the arm to rise to neck level, prompting a review. That went against Kerevi and he was penalised for dangerous play.
Another Australian, the wing Reece Hodge, was cited for standing upright in a challenge with the Fiji flanker Peceli Yato, whose head did make contact and left him concussed. No action was taken against Hodge at the time, but he was given a six-week suspension, reduced by half for mitigating factors.
There was little difference between the actions of Hodge and Patchell as defenders or Yato and Kerevi as ball-carriers, but the decisions taken, the first by a disciplinary panel and the second on the field, were contrasting and inconsistent.
Cheika’s incredulity was understandable. His attack was not against the referee for the Wales match, Romain Poite, but those who lay down the directives for officials to follow. Kerevi’s fear is that looking for a collision to win, which is his stock-in-trade, will become too fraught with the prospect of punishment, especially if a defender is upright.
The framework is in place for a good reason: players’ safety at a time when medical research on concussion shows that just one blow to the head can lead to serious health problems later in life.
It is right that reckless, dangerous challenges that carry an element of intent, or at least the appreciation of a player that his action could have consequences, are not tolerated. But the danger of World Rugby’s statement last week when, after officials accepted referees’ mea culpa that unpunished high challenges should be made public, is that health and safety gets pedalled with excessive zeal.
Cheika’s point that protocol is being decided by doctors and lawyers rather than players current or past was well made. The Wales and Bath centre Jamie Roberts, a qualified doctor, said after the match between Wales and Australia that he did not know which side to take in the Patchell-Kerevi incident. His nationality took him one way but his confrontational playing style took him another. If a player of Roberts’s stature and experience is confused, there is a clear problem. And why, when the old is dead but the new not yet born, is a World Cup, the sport’s biggest tournament, being used to change behaviour?
Roberts had the benefit of hearing what was going on as a television commentator. The crowd at Tokyo Stadium had no idea. Many, after the Hodge case, thought that Patchell’s challenge was being reviewed, as did Australia players. Had Kerevi aimed his forearm at Patchell’s head then no matter the outside-half’s upright stance, it would have been a dangerous act that merited a red card. It was, though, a reflexive response to avoid potential injury and to deem that an act of foul play holds serious ramifications for a sport in which collisions have both increased and intensified. Players are, on average, two stone heavier than they were in the inaugural event in 1987.
World Rugby has made considerable strides in reducing head injuries and, by dealing with reckless challenges, has forced coaches and players to modify their approach to tackling – but now ball-carriers are being targeted. As the former New Zealand coach John Hart put it this week: “There needs to be a more common sense approach to what is a red card offence; it should for something which is malicious, intentional, dangerous. A very clear act.”
It is a question of balance: going too far in one direction risks the safety of players while clotting matches with reviews in which intent does not come into it is frustrating for those who have paid to watch and are not told what is going on.
Japan 2019 has been the open tournament it promised to be and those in charge must ensure that it does not become known for the debate about what constitutes a dangerous tackle or charge.
As Kerevi said, last weekend should have been about the victory of Japan over Ireland in Shizuoka, a match that celebrated all that was good about the sport. Japan were stunning, a whirr of perpetual motion. A television crew was at the team’s media conference on Monday, asking foreign reporters whether they thought the hosts could make the final. All the teams here would have struggled to repress them but such have been Japan’s frailties under the high ball they cannot bank on reaching the last eight yet, never mind go all the way. But they do have the ability to trouble anyone.
And then Wales finally beat a major southern hemisphere team when it mattered with a classy, composed performance against an Australia team who had turned European: strong in the set-pieces and armed with bullocking runners who stormed the gainline. It was a match played to the sound of tables turning and how Wales, so comfortable in their own skin, have seamlessly replaced those thought to be irreplaceable.
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