Tuesday July 11 2006From Tri-Nations, Week 1 As Stuart Dickinson is to South Africans, so Jonathan Kaplan is to Australians - or so it seems. Let's have a look at the latest outburst following Australia's 32-12 defeat at the hands of the Wallabies in Christchurch on Saturday.
Some of what was said was nasty.
Rod Kafer is reported as saying: Kaplan was very poor and made two major mistakes within three minutes in the second half," Kafer said.
"The first was when he failed to spot a clear knock-on by (New Zealand's) Mils Muliaina only to call back the Wallabies later when Lote Tuqiri was on his way to the try-line. The pass to him was certainly not forward.
"One does not expect such mistakes from a four-year-old, let alone an international referee."
Bob Dwyer is reported as saying: "If he is a good referee, then I have never coached a rugby team in my life. He is a joke. Rocky Elsom's sin binning wasn't even an offence."
The list of charges against Kaplan is as follows:
1. Rocky Elsom did not deserve to be sin-binned. In fact he did not deserve to be penalised.
2. Joe Rokocoko played Stephen Larkham illegally.
3. Muliaina's knock-on was not blown.
4. The pass to Lote Tuqiri was not forward and Tuqiri would have scored.
5. The Wallabies were prevented form getting to the ball in the line-out which led to Keven Mealamu's try.
6. Richie McCaw obstructed which led to Mealamu's second try.
7. Advantage was wrongly played which led to Toeava's try.
That all tells you that the All Blacks did not score a single try and the Wallabies scored three. Ergo, the Wallabies won the match.
Seven is a good number. Ewan McKenzie also had seven complaints about Kaplan when the Waratahs lost to the Hurricanes. He was certainly wrong on six counts and the seventh - also to do with advantage - was debatable.
Let's have a look as this latest lot of Seven Deadly Sins.
Let's try to do it calmly as part of our law discussions. If we do not do it in that spirit we end up seeing what we want to see.
1. Rocky Elsom's yellow card.
We mentioned this in our stats part of this week's discussion. (For that click here.)
Kaplan penalised the Wallabies five times in the first half. Three of those penalties were against Elsom at the tackle.
a. 9 mins: Elsom tackles charging Carl Hayman. Hayman falls to ground with Elsom behind him. It is a tackle. Lying on the ground behind Hayman, Elsom picks up the ball and places it over Hayman's body onto his side. The referee has a perfect view of what Elsom did from less than a metre away. Elsom is penalised. It was the first penalty of the match.
Law 15.4 (c) The tackler must get up before playing the ball.
b. 24 mins: The All Blacks are attacking close. Elsom grabs Jerry Collins and brings him down. Collins falls to ground with Elsom on top of him. Elsom puts his hands down to grab the ball. Rodney So'oialo drives in on Elsom and so does Hayman. The referee penalises Elsom.
When Elsom is grabbing at the ball he is on his feet but not supported by them. His knees seem to be on Collins's body. It does also become a ruck, but then Collins may well be hanging on. The first infringement would be by Elsom for not being on his feet.
Law 15.6 (a) After a tackle all other players must be on their feet when they play the ball. Players are on their feet if no other part of their body is supported by the ground or players on the ground.
Elsom objects to be penalised and the referee speaks to George Gregan, the Wallaby captain, saying:"That's the second one from the same man. Don't let him contest my decision again."
c. 26 mins: After Daniel Carter had missed the kick at goal for what happened in b., the Wallabies dropped out, the All Blacks ran and Elsom tackled Byron Kelleher. Having tackled Kelleher, Elsom lay on Kelleher, actually moving his body to have a more smothering effect. There was nobody pinning him down, which suggests that he could have got away. The All Blacks started to exercise their boots, the referee penalised Elsom and flashed him a yellow card and Elsom went without demur.
Law 15.4 (a) When a player tackles an opponent and they both go to ground, the tackler must immediately release the tackled player.
(b) The player must immediately get up and move away from the tackled player and from the ball at once.
Both (a) and (b) carry a penalty kick as a penalty.
Bob Dwyer may well be wrong. The referee may very well have been right. The decision was certainly not a joke, nor a reason to be nasty. Imagine what would have happened if a referee had announced to the world that Dwyer's coaching was "a joke".
2. Aaron Mauger breaks and kicks a rolling ball down towards the Wallaby line. Stephen Larkham races back to the ball. Joe Rokocoko runs for the ball. Larkham gets their first and falls on the ball. Rokocoko goes onto his knees next to Larkham. They are both in motion towards the Wallaby line. Rokocoko puts his right arm on Larkham and gets to his feet to grab at the ball as Stirling Mortlock comes in to support Larkham and then Richie McCaw arrives and bashes into the scene. Others arrive and the ball eventually gets over the Wallaby line. (We shall deal with subsequent events elsewhere as they are not relevant here.)
Law 14.2 (b) Falling over a player on the ground with the ball. A player must not intentionally fall on or over a player with the ball who is lying on the ground.
Rokocoko did not fall on Larkham or over Larkham. Let's say that clearly: Rokocoko did not fall or dive on or over Stephen Larkham.
Nothing in the law says that Rokocoko is not allowed to play Larkham in other ways. Nothing says that he must allow Larkham to get up.
the player on the ground with the ball, i.e. Larkham, must do one of three things - get up with the ball or pass the ball or release the ball. Rokocoko's action did not prevent Larkham from passing or releasing the ball.
It seems that it would be tough to penalise Rokocoko - or in fact Larkham as the gathering of other players happened quickly.
3. The Wallabies are on the attack and up flat. Mark Gerrard comes from the right wing to take a pass from George Gregan from a tackle/ruck. The All Blacks are up flat and with his right foot Gerrard grubbers ahead. Mils Muliaina scampers back low and goes down to grab the bouncing ball which strikes his right shoulder and bounces forward.
The referee is running a line towards Muliaina and has a perfectly unobstructed view of what happens. He does not blow his whistle.
Law 12 A knock-on occurs when a player loses possession of the ball and it goes forward or when a player hits the ball forward with his hand or arm or when the ball hits the hand or the arm and goes forward, and the ball touches the ground or another player before the original player can catch it.
Shoulder is not hand or arm.
It was unusual but the referee is not entitled to blow his whistle because the unusual has happened.
If he had blown for a knock-on in this case he would have been wrong - even if he was a four-year-old
4. Let's look at two passes.
a. Latham gathers a drop-out, runs, chips, collects and passes to Mat Rogers on his right. Rogers scorches on a diagonal towards touch as Daniel Carter comes across to cut him off. As Carter approaches Rogers throws a pass inside to Lote Tuqiri who scores a great try.
Look carefully at the dash lines five metres in from touch. When Rogers passes he is just about at the end of a dash line. When Tuqiri catches the ball he is into the next dash line, i.e. about four metres ahead of the place where Rogers passed the ball.
b. The Wallabies are goring through phases on their right. Then George Gregan passes left to mark Gerrard in the flyhalf position. He passes a long pass to Stephen Larkham. Larkham passes to Lote Tuqiri who stretches flow to catch the ball which is ahead of him.
This is the pass which Kafer - and presumably some others - complained about.
There is a PHILIPS design where Larkham passes. A look at that would suggest that Tuqiri caught the ball from Larkham about two metres in front of the place where Larkham caught the ball.
The first was not blown as forward, the second was.
Error?
Not really.
Look at Rogers's hands. They clearly pass the ball backwards. The infringement is a forward pass, not a forward catch, and scientists will tell you about momentum and impetus in a case like this.
When Larkham passes his hands are not in a backward motion or even in a lateral motion. His hands go forward. That is why the pass was ruled forward.
It was clearly a right decision. If the four-year-old had not blown it he would have been criticised.
In that second pass a try was, by the way, only a remote possibility as Richie McCaw, Rico Gear, Tony Woodcock and Leon MacDonald were on hand to defend and there were some 25 metres to go with a touch-line not far away.
5. Chris Latham and Lote Tuqiri combine to tackle Rico Gear into touch near their left corner flag. This produces a line-out to Australia five metres from their line. They have one man, Greg Holmes, near the front of the line-out and three players - Guy Shepherdson, Dan Vickerman and Mark Chisholm - near the back. Vickerman and Chisholm swap places and hooker Tai McIsaac throws. Vickerman jumps and Jason Eaton of New Zealand jumps as well. Eaton puts out a hand towards Vickerman and makes contact with him. But the fact is that the ball goes well over Vickerman's head to the back where it strikes Shepherdson's hand and falls to ground where Keven Mealamu swoops on it and grabs it just in front of George Smith and scores a try.
It would have been pedantic indeed to have penalised Eaton. It was, as John Connolly acknowledged, a ball that was overthrown. There would be another overthrown ball that led to Mealamu's second try.
6. In this case, too, the wallabies had a line-out five metres from their own line. This time Nathan Sharpe, well supported and clearly unimpeded, goes up for the ball but it is thrown over his head. But this time Shepherdson catches the ball, but the situation is a wobbly one for the wallabies. They manage to scramble the ball back to Gregan who kicks from inside his goal area and clears the ball to about 15 metres from his goal-line on the All Blacks' left.
The All Blacks throw in, catch and make a maul. They drive the maul forward. Mealamu breaks off and drives. They pick and go till there is a heap of players near the Wallaby line with the All Blacks in charge. At the back is Richie McCaw with Mealamu standing behind him. McCaw gets the ball under his left arm and moves at a diagonal towards the touch-line. As he does so he slips the ball to Mealamu who takes it from his captain's grasp and forges straight ahead to score.
When McCaw had the ball, Mealamu was behind him, there for no obstruction. When Mealamu got the ball, McCaw was off to the side and Mealamu went straight ahead. It was just a form of scissors. Mealamu was open to be tackled. There was no obstruction.
7. Funnily enough this one was least debated.
The Wallabies make a penalty into a five-metre line-out on their right and start mauling. They go forward. The maul collapses and the referee puts his arm to show advantage for collapsing the maul. It would be a penalty to Australia.. The collapse is about three metres from the Wallaby line.
The wallabies get the ball back cleanly from the collapsed thing and go left to Larkham. he All Blacks defend and there is a tackle/ruck about ten metres from the All Blacks' line. Again the wallabies get the ball back cleanly and give it to Greg Holmes who charges. The referee calls: "Advantage over."
Again the Wallabies get the ball back and give it to Larkham. He shapes to kick to his left towards Tuqiri on the left wing. But Daniel Carter intervenes he charges down the kick and catches the ball. He passes to his right and the next thing Isaia Toeava is sauntering down the field for the try that gave the All Blacks a bonus point.
Almost certainly the referee got the advantage part wrong. He himself will tell you that he got it wrong. He called Advantage over too early and before there was a real advantage in terms of territory or the freedom to play with a real chance to score. He would tell you that it was not the standard way of playing advantage or what is commonly acceptable as a way of playing advantage. That is what he got wrong.
What happened after that was not his fault. Larkham's faulty kick was not his fault. The players knew that advantage was over and chose to play the way they did, but got it wrong.
Of the seven points of criticism of Kaplan that last one was the quietest - and the one that contained an error on his part! Referees often get more flak when they are right than when they are wrong!
Just as the South Africans are unfair in their attitude to Stuart Dickinson, so the Australians are unfair in their attitude to Jonathan Kaplan. And neither attitude is good for rugby or for refereeing - nor are the unconsidered statements of Rod Kafer and Bob Dwyer.
Kaplan passed the McKenzie test with 6/7. He probably passes this one with 6/7 as well. And his exam was written in the heat of battle.
It's a silly situation. But it's so hard to change perceptions. Australians who would claim to be unbiased will believe that Kaplan had a bad game. New Zealanders who would claim to be unbiased would believe that Kaplan had a good game.
