Wales did not lose because of that penalty

First of all congratulations to SA. They pulled it out of the fire when it was needed.

There has been a lot on here made of that penalty. It even seems to have added fuel to a certain tub thumping posters fire about certain refs but lets be clear. Wales lost that game because they failed to take the ample opportunities that they created. James Hook missed a sitter at the end which would have won the match. Jamie Roberts knocked on a couple of feet from the line and we were back down the other end.

As much as I'd like to be able to blame the ref or anyone else, we put ourselves in the best possible position to win and failed to capitalise.

As far as I'm concerned we should be expecting to win that game. I said a couple of weeks ago that we should be expecting to beat SA and I still think we should. There won't be many better opportunities than that.

Great effort boys but must do better next time. Let's show Samoa and Fiji that we do not like to be beaten and we won't roll over like Wales teams of old

O and for what it's worth I actually think the penalty did miss

I agree pretty much with the points Wrfc1980makes on his thread. Wales didn't lose because of the penalty we lost because we were afraid to win.
Deep down our players didn't believe they should beat South Africa despite dominating them, so they lost the game.

Sadly there is no excuse for this mentality, because we actually play the Southern Hemisphere teams MORE than the 6 Nations ones. We always play each of them once in November, throw in a home game in June and a June tour and we are more exposed to them.

I do wonder if exposing our players more to their provinces might help, South Africa want a 6th Province so maybe allowing them to join the RadoDirect league and compete in Heinaken Cup might be helpful.

Warburton said the same himslef, they have no problem with the decision and no certainty that SA wouldnt have stepped up their game and attacked more had they got the 3 points.

SA are the better side. Losing to them is no disgrace, taking the bonus point for the loss is huge in terms of qualification from this group.

No point dwelling on the loss at all. Dont get that part.
There are key games coming up and wales have tons to look forward to still.
The effort against SA showed they have a near complete package and in any case a loss was expected anyway wasnt it?
Months ago welsh posters were all going on about getting smashed in this group and have just taken the defending champs and pool seeds to one point.
Not that im saying get carried away because that would be a mistake with samoa but take the good from this and understand that wales have heaps to look forward to after that brilliant effort.
Thats gone now so get behind them again and enjoy the ride. One things for sure is I'll be watching all of wales matches. That was great!

Taylorman

Totally agree. I just wanted to make the statement as there are some on this forum who seem to think that as a nation we are happy with defeat and make excuses.

I want to see the boys take that loss personally and go out against Samoa and make a statement.

I also don't agree that it was because they didn't feel they should win. I think the pressure of the occasion got to them and they choked, simple as that. Let's hope it was just a one off and they can come back stronger.


Got to feel sorry for Priestland. Hope he can get over that miss.

The loss can be ascribed to a number of causes. Something seem to happen when we went ahead - we lost a little composure, started making mistakes in crucial poistions.

We need to think about use of the bench too. The Boks substitutions turned them around. We only made one, because AWJ was out on his feet.

Before the game, many posters were expecting Priestland and Hook to alternate at 10/15. I'm surprised Gatland didn't try that, especially after we went behind and we needed the cutting edge in the backline. Despite the territory and possession stats, we made almost no clean breaks.

samuraidragon wrote:... Despite the territory and possession stats, we made almost no clean breaks.

NZ and Australia have struggled to do the same against that Saffa defence in recent weeks (ignoring the games against the Saffa's "B" side early in the 3N of course).

I agree that the penalty didn't lose us the game our failure to take the chances we created did.

The Boks pretty much only had two chances and they took them both.

This is now generally a young squad with saturdays squad having an overall average age of 24.

So hopefully a lot of this squad will now be around for the future and the will now know that they can and should have beaten the Boks and will hopefully be hurt by the loss and go that extra yard to make sure these defats are turned into victories.

The early penalty miss (or not) only influenced the game in so far as the South Africans could close out the game being unadventurous once they'd retaken the lead with Hougaard's try.

The misses of Hook's later penalty, Priestland's close in drop goal (an easy opportunity by international standards) and the failure to finish off the break when Faletau and Roberts got close were the critical errors in attack.

South Africa were very much like we (England) were - rusty and playing poorly but improved by the introduction of players from the bench (du Plessis for SA, Youngs for us) and finished the games in the ascendency and with a scrappy win.

Be interesting to see what happens from here - Wales should take a lot of positives from the performance (back row in particular stood up very well against a good SA unit) if not the result, and so should go in to their games against the Pacific Islands teams with confidence high that they are playing well enough to get through the group matches.

South Africa have a few questions to answer - the biggest one is will PdV be brave enough to drop his captain so that he can play his better hooker, especially in light of the possible absence of Matfield as well?

Wales lost because Priestland failed to nail an easy drop goal after great work to set him up in front of the sticks. Hook also missed a couple of other penalties and they also conceded two soft tries through sloppy defence.

Roberts also knocked on close to the try line in a position were Wales would likely have scored or forced the Boks into conceding a penalty.

Wales were the better side for 60min of that game but let that one slip by not taking their chances. That penalty didn't go over though.

The Boks took the chances they had and that shows once again the difference between the SH and NH sides.

I think the blame culture is unhealthy. we lost because we failed to capitalise on all of our strengths. Hook and Priestland will both know that they could have won us the game. Hope they don't read the papers.

Unlucky Wales on another "brave defeat"....

dummy_half wrote:The early penalty miss (or not) only influenced the game in so far as the South Africans could close out the game being unadventurous once they'd retaken the lead with Hougaard's try.

The misses of Hook's later penalty, Priestland's close in drop goal (an easy opportunity by international standards) and the failure to finish off the break when Faletau and Roberts got close were the critical errors in attack.

South Africa were very much like we (England) were - rusty and playing poorly but improved by the introduction of players from the bench (du Plessis for SA, Youngs for us) and finished the games in the ascendency and with a scrappy win.

Be interesting to see what happens from here - Wales should take a lot of positives from the performance (back row in particular stood up very well against a good SA unit) if not the result, and so should go in to their games against the Pacific Islands teams with confidence high that they are playing well enough to get through the group matches.

South Africa have a few questions to answer - the biggest one is will PdV be brave enough to drop his captain so that he can play his better hooker, especially in light of the possible absence of Matfield as well?

good post, Sir, and I agree with you on John Smit.

I have heard a lot of talk that South Africa would have upped their game if the penalty had gone over.
Personally I doubt if they could have they had to fight tooth and nail to get that one point win.
Sides that have another gear do not defend a one point lead from the 66 min onwards.
Wales lost that game yesterday due to our failure to put more points on the board so yes that penalty could have made a massive difference,

Wales didn't lose 'cos of the penalty, they also didn't lose because they were "afraid to win" - They lost because when it mattered SA had the cutting edge in the red zone and we didn't. That's not bottling it, its not because we're not used to winning these games it's just a fact of the match. The defining moment was when we were 16-10 up and Toby and Roberts ripped through the SA defence only for the ball to fumble forward. Hook missed a penalty at the end and Priestland a drop goal - None of them were afraid to win. If Hooks kick had gone over then we might be saying something else. Just accept the hard facts that we were a bit unlucky and we missed some simple pots at goal which would have won us the match. This result is nothing to do with history and failure to close out games etc - That's black magic and restrospective cowpat. We missed a penalty at the end of the game to win - Move on

Cymroglan wrote:I have heard a lot of talk that South Africa would have upped their game if the penalty had gone over.
Personally I doubt if they could have they had to fight tooth and nail to get that one point win.
Sides that have another gear do not defend a one point lead from the 66 min onwards.
Wales lost that game yesterday due to our failure to put more points on the board so yes that penalty could have made a massive difference,

The talk came from Sam Warburton

Peter Seabiscuit Wheeler wrote:

Cymroglan wrote:I have heard a lot of talk that South Africa would have upped their game if the penalty had gone over.
Personally I doubt if they could have they had to fight tooth and nail to get that one point win.
Sides that have another gear do not defend a one point lead from the 66 min onwards.
Wales lost that game yesterday due to our failure to put more points on the board so yes that penalty could have made a massive difference,

The talk came from Sam Warburton

It's my observation of the game.

The real difference between the teams was taking the chances on offer. Wales had the opportunity to win, and it wouldn't have been undeserved if they had, but they didn't take it, and SA did take theirs. Whether it's experience, or quality in key players, or self-belief, I don't know, but that was the difference between the sides.

Very proud of the Welsh team - the first time I've seen them physically match the Boks. A great game of rugby to watch. Well done South Africa, and it'll be interesting to see how the rest of the tournament goes for both teams.

dogtooth I think that's very harsh on the Welsh team. Don't forget this was a very young Welsh side coming up against a battle hardened ageing South African side with great world cup pedigree.

Wales will have won over a lot of neutrals with their performance. It was a good game and I thought Wales were the better team. Just couldn't quite close it out. In the end the experience of the Bok's shone through.

I agree with Bluenote. It's debatable whether it was the weight of expectation, experience etc.

Personally I think it was South Africa's experiences and bench which made the difference. Players like Hougaard and Du Plessis did make a huge impact when they came on.

I think Gatland should have possibly utilised his bench more effectively.

beshoked, youve been around for a while, you might know i am usually one of the 'didnt we do well' brigade.

the wales team doesnt need a pat on the back for losing to an ageing, weakened team with no creative game plan, no ball or territory. the team that lost, wales-again- needs a kick up the fleshy lump-and i dont mean their heads.

Hook missed the penalty, we lost - move on - Fine lines that's all - If NZ had lost like that that's all people would be saying, it came down to one poor miss. Peole just like to get historical and hysterical when its Wales - That's life, its a bit like stereotyping

dogtooth all I am saying is that you should look at the positives. Your young and inexperienced Welsh side wasn't over awed or outmuscled by a lot more experienced South African team who are the defending world champions.

Your very young backrow held their own. Sam Warburton was excellent. Dan Lydiate was good too. After a quiet 1st half Toby Faletau had a barnstorming 2nd half.

Priestland didn't look out of place, Jamie Roberts and Jonathan Davies made good progress with ball in hand etc.

Play like that against Fiji and Samoa and you'll win comfortably.

Wales will improve the likes of Matfield and Smit aren't going to be in the South Africa for much longer - how do you replace Smit's leadership and Matfield's lineout abilities?

beshocked wrote:Wales will improve the likes of Matfield and Smit aren't going to be in the South Africa for much longer - how do you replace Smit's leadership and Matfield's lineout abilities?

Well, when Schalk took over the team looked better and Matfield is already the second choice in most of SA's view. Andries Bekker has been the form lock this whole S15 season.

Peter Seabiscuit Wheeler wrote:
The talk came from Sam Warburton

Sam said something similar, but entirely different to what Cymro says here.

As for the article, it appears the players share your attitude which is good to see. They're all concentrating on our next opponents.

Onwards and upwards for the Welsh squad and forget about the "never was " penalty. The players certainly didn't dwell on it in the game and for all we know it fired up Wales to perform even more highly .

Focus on Samoa now as Gatland etc will be , interesting game against Namibia for them on Wednesday .The Namibians showed enough against Fiji not to be taken too lightly so the Samoans cannot rest too many first choice players a 3 day turn around for them gives Wales the advantage in recovery and analyses.

Excellent Welsh performance yesterday the trick now is to back it up personally I think we are on an upward track and more of the same should see us home by more than one score .

Can we get away from this blame culture not one individual was responsible for the loss.

If we had won then the team would have celebrated as a team and I am pretty sure that the team itself is not blaming one individual.

Yes Hook mised a kick as did Priestland with the drop goal.

But what about the gaping hole in defence for Hougard to stroll through or the player (not sure who) that gave away the penalty for Steyn to kick.

The squad I am pretty sure will get over it and now focus on hopefully winning our remaining games and setting up a quarter match up with Australia (probably)

i couldnt think of any player who didnt play at thier best, the team played at their very best, and as we know wales' best is losing by a gnats wing.

no need to make any changes in the XV but the bench could do with a few more caps. steve and ryan should be on the bench next weekend, maybe geth too

dog,

I would be tempted to rest Shane and give Halfpenny and Brew a share of the game maybe agree that SJ and Geth on the bench for some game time.

Other than that leave it as it is and let them get confidence and continuity as a team.

We can't make too many changes as this next game is a big game and we must try to stop them getting a bonus point. I agree with Bedford Bryne must play he still tackles well, good positional play and can catch the ball although his kicking out of hand could be better. I also agree 1/2 Penny and Brew should get some game time in place of Shane. Great to also get Gethin on as a sub.

I have not heard of any comments on the ref's performance, there were two knock on's prior to the SA second try the ref was in a bad position, the penalty Hook missed at the end of the game did not look like a penalty, Lydiate penalty for going too early of the scrum was wrong IMO and there were so many other knock on's that were ignored as well as offside's. This is without not using the TMO for Hook's penalty kick. I am sure NZ would like him to ref the NZ v France game. Even Phil Vickery said he made wrong calls at the scrum!

Barnes kept the game going because he was ignoring so much, maybe he made it a good game for the non Welsh/SA supporters!

My argument at the time was also that the pass to Faletau was forward but then the SA no.18 should of been binned (at least) for the late hit on Warburton on the ground.

The good news is that on top of the good performance Warburton acknowledges the truth - there was no proof the ruling on the kick would have had any change on the result. - a view also shared by a lot of welsh posters here for a change

The bad news is that here in Wales in the media they are at it big time - 'because of the kick which has been proved to have gone over Wales lost'

How bad was the ITV coverage? Where was the slo-mo replay, as they did with Toby's try?

It's an interesting incident, not because it influenced the result - there are uncountable incidents in a game that do that - but because it is so rare. I for one thought it was out , then the one replay they did show suggested it had curled in at the last moment. It would not have been easy for the officials behind the posts to judge with the naked eye either.

We probably should be using video technology a lot more in the game. So many tries are allowed or disallowed now on the basis of replays, it's hard to imagine how refs ever managed without it. Obviously they must have got quite a few calls wrong, but everyone accepted it as part of the game. Now the refs have so much on their plate - calling forward passes and scrum infringements (eg. Lydiate's legitimate steal) right is almost impossible. And so many big games are decided by a margin of one score.

There does seem to be something going on with the wind and the ball too. It was noticeable that the Bok back 3 spilled or fumbled quite a few kicks as well. In the England game Wilkinson missed a straightforward kick by an enormous distance. Never seen that before.

I thought the kick went over to be honest.,But why could.nt the ref go to the TMO?

After the RWC they have to have a look at what the TMO can rule on or not, i personaly think then TMO should be in touch with the REF all the time.

What does every one else think.

the laws of rugby clearly layout what matters a referee can refer to a tmo for a ruling/clarification.
The problem is getting people and George Clancy to familiarise themselves with the legislation.

On Superrugby last night Andre Watson was the guest, and they asked him about the kick and the review by the TMO.

HE said that even if they did review the kick, the TMO has to be absolutely convinced that the kick is over, and on the eveidance that Andre Watson looked at, there was absolutely no evidence or angles good enough to prove that the kick was over. so the outacome of the kick would have reverted back to Barnes and not given.

On another note, the penalty that Hook missed on the 72 minute mark was incorrect, George north was the Tackler and he never released the player and that on the evidence he looked at, South africa should have been awarded a penalty, so perhaps a little justice in that instance.

I would suggest you go look at that incident again, and it will be clear the tackler never released Francois Hougaard.

majesticimperialman wrote:I thought the kick went over to be honest.,But why could.nt the ref go to the TMO?

After the RWC they have to have a look at what the TMO can rule on or not, i personaly think then TMO should be in touch with the REF all the time.

What does every one else think.

He could, but he and the touch judges were happy that it didnt go over.

biltongbek wrote:On another note, the penalty that Hook missed on the 72 minute mark was incorrect, George north was the Tackler and he never released the player and that on the evidence he looked at, South africa should have been awarded a penalty, so perhaps a little justice in that instance

I said that at the time and I accused of hating the Welsh EDIT: It was an emotional time so I forgave him

biltongbek wrote:On Superrugby last night Andre Watson was the guest, and they asked him about the kick and the review by the TMO.

HE said that even if they did review the kick, the TMO has to be absolutely convinced that the kick is over, and on the eveidance that Andre Watson looked at, there was absolutely no evidence or angles good enough to prove that the kick was over. so the outacome of the kick would have reverted back to Barnes and not given.

On another note, the penalty that Hook missed on the 72 minute mark was incorrect, George north was the Tackler and he never released the player and that on the evidence he looked at, South africa should have been awarded a penalty, so perhaps a little justice in that instance.

I would suggest you go look at that incident again, and it will be clear the tackler never released Francois Hougaard.

I have to agree. The touch judges probably had the best view. The ball swung back towars the posts, the tj's probably, and the boks, probably had the only view that could say for certain. Have to agree with your comments re the tackle, it happened a bit suring the game. Have a look at the Welsh defence in the last few minutes, the side nearest the camera is pretty much camped offside. I was cheering for Wales and didn't notice it at the time. I think it's a case of swings and roundabouts. Given the relative penalty count, I wouldn't be too upset, or vocal, if I were the Welsh management.

So theres a million incidents taht we can see influenced the game (suprise?), really Wales' problem is that their best isnt good enough when it isnt their day.

Apparently one of the Bok players - Steyn? - told Gatland the kick went over. Given the height of the kick, you'd probably need mutliple angles and playbacks to be sure.

On that last penalty, I agree. But wasn't the penalty the Boks scored a little fishy too?

A million incidents do indeed decide the game. The Boks won because they scored more points. End of. I don't think many welsh fans are claiming we wuz robbed, coulda, shoulda, etc. but that doesn't mean that some of these interesting incidents shouldn't get discussed here. Life would be a bit boring otherwise.

Congrats to South Africa for ice-cool nerve, excellent use of the bench (yup, PDV got that one right), and two very well-taken tries.

when I first saw it I thought it went over but then on the replay I agreed that it missed. It doesn't really matter as it wasn't given and we still didn't do enough to win.

Interestingly it reminds me of an Italy v Ireland match years ago when an Ireland penalty clearly went wide but was awarded. It broke Italy that day who had been doing pretty well early on. Does anyone else remember that?

As an England fan i wanted the Saffers to win, but have to say i thought that the kick was over and without a doubt i felt that Wales deserved to win the game.
Unfortunate, so put it behind you, and i can see Wales getting through to the quarters on that kind of showing. Well done!

Penalty gate

Peter Seabiscuit Wheeler wrote:

majesticimperialman wrote:I thought the kick went over to be honest.,But why could.nt the ref go to the TMO?

After the RWC they have to have a look at what the TMO can rule on or not, i personaly think then TMO should be in touch with the REF all the time.

What does every one else think.

He could, but he and the touch judges were happy that it didnt go over.

He also wasn't asked to check upstairs by any of the Welsh players (or more importantly Warburton), till it was too late.

As hard as it is to swallow these things happen in the game and its just one of those things.

Have we all forgotten Phillips' try against Ireland last year? It shouldn't have stood but it did so as they say what goes around comes around around.

We had enough other chances to win that game

What gets me with regards to this is that normally Super Sport (SA's rugby world cup channel) would normally show something controversial in 7 different ways but they didn't for the kick. Wasn't there enough camera views?

But in any case, many things seemed wrong to me. Wales try felt to me like it was a forward pass - although the refs probably only look at the action to regard it as forward or not and the last penalty Wales got, plus a few other things that irked me that Wales weren't penalised for.

But I am pretty sure that for every thing I mentioned there will be something to mention about the Springboks as well. The refs can't see everything, so we will have to live with it.

And IMO it wasn't over, besides two touch judges won't be wrong.

Fern, there were no other angles, that's why they couldn't show them. Andre Watson mentioned it.

As Tom Shanklin said, the person best placed to call it was the touch judge.

nevermind the kick, warburton said it best when he said who knows if that had gone over how it would have altered the match anyway? there was still about 50 minutes to play at that point.

the reason we lost was not taking the points on offer when we should have, SA did, and thats why they won.

(personally I thought it had gone over, but if the TJ's say it wasnt, then them being about 5 foot from the posts and me being the other side of the world, ill give them the benefit of the doubt).