Rolland Saves Deans' Bacon?

Chris Rattue suggested today in the NZ Herald that SANZAR should kick Rolland out of the Rugby Championship, and also that only his inept whistle happy performance saved the Wallabies from an absolute embarrassment.

Is he right?

In the same article he also suggested the demise of Auckland warriors coach Brian Mclenan... He was fired about an hour ago.

Rattue or McLennan was fired? Hopefully both.

hehe ..Bluey not Ratts..

Do you guys not think he is a good ref?

leinster

Personally I agree that he is far too pedantic, and I believe at least three or four of the Southern hemisphere refs are the best in the World.

Rolland in my opinion, (even taking into account that he might be at the end of his careeer) is one of the better Northern hemisphere referees, and our teams have to learn to adjust to Nh refs, and for that reason I think its good that teams like the ABs get games under the adjudication of Rolland , as opposed to some of the others.

He also said it would be the end of the career of Deans. I agree.

Ive been saying for 2-3 years that Deans is hopeless at the international level. He doesnt get Oz rugby, hasnt put it in any better position than it was when he started, has a terrible record and lost to sides ranked so low they were 'shocks'.

A world cup win over SA in the last 8 and a 3N title (when the AB's went for world cup cover) is all he has to show for it.

He can stay there as far as Im concerned...happy days...

He's fine. Sure he may have blown the whistle a bit but then that's part of his job. If Ratts said something you can be confident it's wrong.

I actually think that Robbie Deans is a very good coach, the problem is that he just isnt the right coach for Australia. ( McKenzie's the man)

The Australians couldnt have been expected to adjust to the Canterbury way of doing things in a year or two, it took years to evolve in canterbury as it is.

I should also add that I have similar concerns for Munster and Rob Penney.

Rolland like most NH refs does`nt play the advantage law to well,but most of the penalties were scrum time.That has more to do with the laws than the ref.

The fact is that if you watch NZ v Wales, or ENG v SA, or SA v NZ or ENG v NZ or FRA vs any of the above, the majority of scrums stay up. As soon as Australia come into the equation suddenly almost every scrum is messy and almost every scrum goes down. It doesn't take a genius to spot the common factor. Rolland seemed to ping in pedulum form one team after the other at every scrum. Given the number of knock ons, there were a lot of scrums. Given that, there were a lot of ping pong penalties which made the game artificially even. Now add to that his completely bizarre interpretation of offensive breakdown penalties which invariably favoured the defensive team and you have a recipe for a referee who has to a large extent determined the outcome of the game. I'll go so far as to say Rolland is a mediocre referee.

Rattue's point about NZ needing to humour the more erratic northern hemisphere referees regularly in order to know how to deal with their foibles when the RWC rolls around is a frustrating truth is my mind.

I've got a couple of questions?

Are we heading to another period of anti-rugby? Sorry for the use of the word. I'm talking about a time when the odds of being penalised offesively matched with slow ball and effective defensive lines leads to an era of aerial ping pong and positional kicking. My worry is we are.

Is there an optimum no of penalties per game? Obviously refereeing is an art. The penalty count reflects the referee's interpretation. I don't enjoy referees with low penalty counts (e.g. Barnes or B Lawrence) or when the penalty count is high.

Blackcanelion,

I would say that we are progressing more and more towards a faster game. However I do think that there is a worry about the unpredictability of conceding penalties especially at the scrum and breakdown.

Great display from Rolland in my view. I wish he reffed Jouberts games in the Aus/Wales series on that performance. You can't commit continuous offences at the breakdown for the sake of faster rugby, don't see what there is to complain about. Great game to watch though anyway.

Morgannwg wrote:Great display from Rolland in my view. I wish he reffed Jouberts games in the Aus/Wales series on that performance. You can't commit continuous offences at the breakdown for the sake of faster rugby, don't see what there is to complain about. Great game to watch though anyway.

If Wales had Rolland reffing in any of the games on tour, Wales would have won, especially the second and third tests. For me I am the opposite of the general consensus on this thread as I think that the NH refs are far superior to their SH counterparts. The last few times Wales have played against Australia we have had SH refs and our inability to alter to their interpretations have cost us, SH refs are too lacks 'a' daisy when it comes to the breakdown, scrummaging and all round forward play, they seem to allow teams to stifle the attacking team without any punishment. Although some NH ref can also be over pedantic, I will not name names.

You usually find that the teams that dont want fast running play and skills executed at pace are usually very slow and have low repetitive speed fitness.

I don't think the ref made much difference to overall tour, I was just left baffled at Jouberts 'interpretations' in that final test. Articles like that from Rattue lead me to believe the SH don't want to play by the rules for the sake of more running.

Chris Rattue is a poor man's Stephen Jones.

sugarNspikes wrote:Chris Rattue is a poor man's Stephen Jones.

That implies Jones is of some quality. Rattue doesn't have the massive chip on his shoulder about a country though despite the village idiots claim. Not defending him as I don't like a lot of what he writes either but Jones is pretty much on a level by himself. The sad thing is the Kiwis who rise to his bait often make up the minority he's trying to portray as the majority-thus giving the rest of us who don't care what he has to say about NZ a bad name. Though I understand it'd be hard not to react when someone slags off your country to the audience he has.

Nah, they're as bad as each other.

I'll give you that-I'm sure a Kiwi must have bumped uglies with his wife or something though!

Very harsh calls on ABs when they had driven Oz back (one of them resulted in an AB forward touching down) and he said they had not kept their feet.

Some of the discipline on both sides was poor. He can only adjudicate on what he sees. But it seems he pings very specific things, namely the scrum. He thinks as a former scrum half he fancies he knows what's going on there. I just wish he'd play the advantage more as he kills the game of any continuity. By all means stick out your hand but give the attacking team a chance to use good quality ball and come back to the infringement if after a few phases it doesn't amount to anything.

But strange if he's a so-called stickler for the rules that he doesn't know how to keep a proper offside line. ABs were allowed an overly generous headstart for most of the first half.

Tbh I thought some of the best rugby was played a few seasons back when refs went for the yellow early in games after a couple of repeat infringements. It got both teams attentions straight away and generally cleared the match up for the remaining 60 odd mins.

LordDowlais wrote:

Morgannwg wrote:Great display from Rolland in my view. I wish he reffed Jouberts games in the Aus/Wales series on that performance. You can't commit continuous offences at the breakdown for the sake of faster rugby, don't see what there is to complain about. Great game to watch though anyway.

If Wales had Rolland reffing in any of the games on tour, Wales would have won, especially the second and third tests. For me I am the opposite of the general consensus on this thread as I think that the NH refs are far superior to their SH counterparts. The last few times Wales have played against Australia we have had SH refs and our inability to alter to their interpretations have cost us, SH refs are too lacks 'a' daisy when it comes to the breakdown, scrummaging and all round forward play, they seem to allow teams to stifle the attacking team without any punishment. Although some NH ref can also be over pedantic, I will not name names.

Isn't it funny how many factors always seem to conspire that result in Wales losing?

lacks a daisy!

I thought Rolland was lacks a daffodil in the semi final against France.

It's not about lacks'a'daisy at all. It's about empathy.

If one team's prop puts his hand down momentarily to sure up a scrum once in the 13th minute of a game when the scrum battle has been good, then is it a penalty? or play on? play on. But if the backrow are permanently not bound properly to the ruck to gain advantage in defense then is it a penalty? yes.

If a team counter-ruck in numbers and drive the opponent off the ball and as the 9 clears, a loose forward loses his feet is it a penalty? not in my mind. If an attacking player dives into the other side of the ruck to slow the ball down, is it a penalty? yes.

Thing is a referee like Mr Rolland will penalising absolutely everything he can find with no context and then a guy like Joubert will take a sensible approach and let the game get some momentum.

It's not about letting a team away with a constant string of infringements, it's about decide what is an infringement and what is an irrelevant consequence of physics.

I think the rugby on display in 2005 was of the highest quality.

The All Blacks reached a level that no team has got to since and we saw Wales, France and Ireland all capable of playing some very good rugby.

Aerial Ping Pong had not arrived. Sealing off had not reared its head just yet and it was back before Crouch Touch Pause Engage confused things with the scurm.

anotherworldofpain wrote:The fact is that if you watch NZ v Wales, or ENG v SA, or SA v NZ or ENG v NZ or FRA vs any of the above, the majority of scrums stay up. As soon as Australia come into the equation suddenly almost every scrum is messy and almost every scrum goes down. It doesn't take a genius to spot the common factor. Rolland seemed to ping in pedulum form one team after the other at every scrum. Given the number of knock ons, there were a lot of scrums. Given that, there were a lot of ping pong penalties which made the game artificially even. Now add to that his completely bizarre interpretation of offensive breakdown penalties which invariably favoured the defensive team and you have a recipe for a referee who has to a large extent determined the outcome of the game. I'll go so far as to say Rolland is a mediocre referee.

Rattue's point about NZ needing to humour the more erratic northern hemisphere referees regularly in order to know how to deal with their foibles when the RWC rolls around is a frustrating truth is my mind.

Can't disagree with comments about the scrum, but as for the breakdown, if players continually enter from and/or find themselves in an offside position, or make no attempt to stay on your feet, they deserved to be pinged!
Non-NZ press, commentators, and refs have been going on about it for ages. I'm all for committing numbers to speed up the game, but they have to make an effort to stay up.

anotherworldofpain wrote:It's not about lacks'a'daisy at all. It's about empathy.

If one team's prop puts his hand down momentarily to sure up a scrum once in the 13th minute of a game when the scrum battle has been good, then is it a penalty? or play on? play on. But if the backrow are permanently not bound properly to the ruck to gain advantage in defense then is it a penalty? yes.

If a team counter-ruck in numbers and drive the opponent off the ball and as the 9 clears, a loose forward loses his feet is it a penalty? not in my mind. If an attacking player dives into the other side of the ruck to slow the ball down, is it a penalty? yes.

Thing is a referee like Mr Rolland will penalising absolutely everything he can find with no context and then a guy like Joubert will take a sensible approach and let the game get some momentum.

It's not about letting a team away with a constant string of infringements, it's about decide what is an infringement and what is an irrelevant consequence of physics.

Nah your wrong, the amount of times I have watched a game reffed by a SH ref where the scrum is going to pot but the ref just allows the offending team to get the ball out as quick as they can rather than blow for a penalty is beyond belief, the amount of times I have seen players flop all over the ball at the breakdown or come in from the side is again beyond belief, look I am all for speeding the game up and I agree there are a lot of pedantic refs up here in the NH, but for the most at least the NH refs apply the rules, for the most part SH refs just seem to turn a blind eye to what ever the forwards are doing because they want to have a quick game all for the "empathy" but at what cost ? I for one would love to see a ref dish out a yellow card in the first minute for hands in the ruck or no binding at a scrum or collapsing a maul rather than just letting the ball go out quicker for the spirit of the game, rules are rules and if you break them then you shpuld get punished, if this keeps happening then you will soon see it happening less and less, but if you keep a blind eye just for the empathy, the game will always be in disrepute. Apply the laws accordingly, forget empathy from the refs until the players start showing empathy themselves, if a players is sent to the bin in the first ten minutes he will not be able to offend again for the rest of the game as he will get a red, also it will deture others from doing the same as well.

Also note your comments on consistency. Yep, that is lacking.

bathmad wrote:Also note your comments on consistency. Yep, that is lacking.

Is that aimed at me ?

Nope - AWOP

LordDowlais wrote:

anotherworldofpain wrote:It's not about lacks'a'daisy at all. It's about empathy.

If one team's prop puts his hand down momentarily to sure up a scrum once in the 13th minute of a game when the scrum battle has been good, then is it a penalty? or play on? play on. But if the backrow are permanently not bound properly to the ruck to gain advantage in defense then is it a penalty? yes.

If a team counter-ruck in numbers and drive the opponent off the ball and as the 9 clears, a loose forward loses his feet is it a penalty? not in my mind. If an attacking player dives into the other side of the ruck to slow the ball down, is it a penalty? yes.

Thing is a referee like Mr Rolland will penalising absolutely everything he can find with no context and then a guy like Joubert will take a sensible approach and let the game get some momentum.

It's not about letting a team away with a constant string of infringements, it's about decide what is an infringement and what is an irrelevant consequence of physics.

Nah your wrong, the amount of times I have watched a game reffed by a SH ref where the scrum is going to pot but the ref just allows the offending team to get the ball out as quick as they can rather than blow for a penalty is beyond belief, the amount of times I have seen players flop all over the ball at the breakdown or come in from the side is again beyond belief, look I am all for speeding the game up and I agree there are a lot of pedantic refs up here in the NH, but for the most at least the NH refs apply the rules, for the most part SH refs just seem to turn a blind eye to what ever the forwards are doing because they want to have a quick game all for the "empathy" but at what cost ? I for one would love to see a ref dish out a yellow card in the first minute for hands in the ruck or no binding at a scrum or collapsing a maul rather than just letting the ball go out quicker for the spirit of the game, rules are rules and if you break them then you shpuld get punished, if this keeps happening then you will soon see it happening less and less, but if you keep a blind eye just for the empathy, the game will always be in disrepute. Apply the laws accordingly, forget empathy from the refs until the players start showing empathy themselves, if a players is sent to the bin in the first ten minutes he will not be able to offend again for the rest of the game as he will get a red, also it will deture others from doing the same as well.

Nigel Owens does that too. As a Munster fan I have seen all too often our boys flopping over the ball and not getting pinged by French, English or Welsh referees.

I think people have this whole NH v SH thing to suit themselves.

Personally I don't believe there is a NH or SH divide in consistency. I believe that it is more like country to country or maybe even indiviudal referee to individual referee.

New Zealand's Vinny Munro to me has a very different demeanor to Steve Walsh.

Nigel Owens is like chalk and cheese compared with Romain Poite.

If it was North v South things would be much easier to follow.

It is much more inconsistent.

Various posters (excepting red_stag) who make a seperate and good point...

You miss the point completely (like so many NH refs). I am not saying don't apply the laws in the name of "speeding up the game" and call this "empathy". I am saying that refereeing with empathy for the game is about not refeering like you are deliberately finding things that could be penalise and penalising them.

If the scrum is going to pot, so what? as long as it hasn't gone to pot in a way that is illegal and was deliebrately employed by one team to gain an advantage in an illegal way.

The side effect of the pedantic nature of some NH refs (glad you agree) is that in their pain to spot every single thing that might be a penalisable offense they miss the big picture and then things like a blatant forward pass in a rwc quarterfinal get missed, or for example a player making a quick throw in with the wrong ball, or an off-the ball spear tackle gets a yellow in stead of a red, or an innocuous single leg lifting tackle gets a yellow instead of nothing because the referee is too blinkered and not understanding the pattern of what is happening.

You'd seriously like a yellow card for a hand in the ruck or not binding in the scrum in the first minute? Not if it were a Welsh player being binned. What about warning a player?

I don't have a problem with a ref laying down the law. But I agree with AWOP in that there is an interpretation of the game. If a player comes round from the side then ping him. If a player seals off a ruck and doesn't hold his feet then ping him. But if you march forward 20m and there is no Aussie defence in front of you and you lose your feet, why on earth should that be pinged?

What separates the good referees from the bad referees is knowing when not to blow the whistle.

That doesn't mean ignoring it. It might mean a quiet word on the way to the next lineout to the player.

If it looks as though player is making a habit of it then it becomes worth penalising.

That way the game flows, the temperment of the players remains calm and yet you have showed the players that you are in control.

Taylorman wrote:He also said it would be the end of the career of Deans. I agree.

Ive been saying for 2-3 years that Deans is hopeless at the international level. He doesnt get Oz rugby, hasnt put it in any better position than it was when he started, has a terrible record and lost to sides ranked so low they were 'shocks'.

A world cup win over SA in the last 8 and a 3N title (when the AB's went for world cup cover) is all he has to show for it.

He can stay there as far as Im concerned...happy days...

Love this. 3rd place at the World Cup, Tri-Nations champions and whitewash over the 6 Nations GS champions "is all he has to show for it".

What a terrible coach! Fire him now!!

Can someone tell me who these awesome forwards are that Deans is supposed to be picking in order to beat New Zealand?? He has rubbish props, one decent (yet ageing) lock and only 2/3 of a back row, and yet for some reason no side ever seems able to fully press home obvious advantage against the Wallabies forwards.

Now this thread is about yet another (not the first by any means) ref failing to penalise the Aussie scrum. This has been going on for years. Rolland is not the first to be duped. Perhaps some credit ought to go to the Wallabies forwards coaches. They seem to continuously pull off this remarkable trick of conning refs.

There is no doubt that Australian rugby isn't in good shape, and that there's a serious lack of depth in any number of positions, particularly prop. I just struggle to see what Deans has really done wrong. Not sure you can grow top class forwards in four years.

Look guys, we whitnesed both sides during the last world cup. In one game, Bryce Lawrence allowed the Australians to get away with bloody murder at the rucks and scrums, you could say he turned a blind eye for the empathy of the game, but as a result South Africa lost, now we could say that the Springboks should have done the same and I would agree they should have but it was a mess of a game as a result and has caused numerous bun fights on here, Biltong I am looking at you . Now on the other side of the coin we saw Allain Rolland red card Sam Warburton for a spear tackle which could be argued that he should have just used a yellow for the empathy of the game, which of course if he had done would have been against the rules as we all agree that a dangerous spear tackle is indeed worthy of a red card and was rightly given to Sam Warburton.Now, the question I ask is this, How many dangerous tackles do we now see during a game due to the fact a precedent has been set during the world cup ? Hardley any is the answer as all the players now know what will happen if they are not carefull, and we have indeed seen examples where players are mindfull and when they hit the oposition hard they make sure they do it fairly and safely. Now, due to refs allowing the game to flow for the empathy of the game and allowing players to do what they want how often do we see collapsed scrums, hands in rucks, illeagal binding ? Every game is the answer, and we can always predict before a game which team will be using these tactics the most, if a precedent was set then we would not see this in every game. I agree as well with the fact that all refs should be consistant, but to put my point forward, all rules should not be broken and a zero tollerance attitude is needed.

P.s I am sorry if I started to ramble on but I just caught a nerve when typing this post and reading this thread.

Sorry to keep on, but the point I was making is, that Allain Rolland did not do anything wrong for red carding Sam Warburton going against the empathy of the game, but Bryce Lawrence did ref the game incorrectly for letting the Aussies get away with bloody murder just for the empathy of the game. So to tei it up nice and neatly. Allen Rolland - Nothing to answer for, Bryce Lawrence- Explain yourself.

anotherworldofpain wrote:

Isn't it funny how many factors always seem to conspire that result in Wales losing?

Not sure what you are talking about. Ironic you changing your tune on Rolland though now that you think your Blacks are on the recieving end eh ghostie? According to you he was faultless in the world cup. For the record, I also think Wayne Barnes had a faultless game back in a 2007 RWC quarter final; so I actually agree with Stephen Jones on something .

Is it the national coaches job to be growing these world class forwards or the SR teams coaches?

I'd say it was the SR teams coaches who are letting Deans down at the moment. He should have a crop of already international class players to choose from much like SA and Nz do and then he should just need to give them a fine tuning.

Likewise Deans not putting Australian Rugby in a better position then four years ago, you have to ask who else has tried to help him do this? No one as far as I can see, infact more and more the SuperRugby sides are making the national coaches life harder as they slowly spread the already small talent out over a wider area and more injuries occur.

Interesting thing was there were only two penalties given at the breakdown both against Pocock.But at nearly every Scrum there was a whistle and there were a lot of scrums.The offside law seemed hardly policed the rush/blitz defence CAN`T work if the offside law is strictly policed.Nonu was pinged early on for CROSSING[Obstruction]when judging from the Tv cameras.He was tackled high off the ball.a Yellow for that?.

Not a yellow for that but certainly not a penalty against Nonu.

Nonu took out a player after running a decoy. Wouldn't have mattered for the try which is what saved him I guess but that warranted a penalty.

You are confusing empathy with not penalising fouls.

emack2 wrote:Interesting thing was there were only two penalties given at the breakdown both against Pocock.But at nearly every Scrum there was a whistle and there were a lot of scrums.The offside law seemed hardly policed the rush/blitz defence CAN`T work if the offside law is strictly policed.Nonu was pinged early on for CROSSING[Obstruction]when judging from the Tv cameras.He was tackled high off the ball.a Yellow for that?.

I respect your comments emack, as you have seen a lot of rugby in your time. But there were way more than two penalties given at the breakdown. Messam twice early in the game springs to mind, but there were many more from both teams.

I am not a fan of Rolland as he comes across as wanting to be the most important person on the pitch (just my opinion). He and his officials missed some stuff (knock ons - forward passes) that get missed in every game. His policing of the offside line wasn't very good though.

But allowing for that lot he penalised what thought warranted penalising - i.e. blatant cheating.

All referees are told not to penalise stuff that hasn't materially affected the play. I saw plenty of evidence of that approach in the game.

As I'm usually not a fan of the guy, from a neutral point of view, he had one of his better games.

Morgannwg wrote:

anotherworldofpain wrote:

Isn't it funny how many factors always seem to conspire that result in Wales losing?

Not sure what you are talking about. Ironic you changing your tune on Rolland though now that you think your Blacks are on the recieving end eh ghostie? According to you he was faultless in the world cup. For the record, I also think Wayne Barnes had a faultless game back in a 2007 RWC quarter final; so I actually agree with Stephen Jones on something .

Then you don't understand the game at all.

But ghostie you can't decide where refs should show empathy over the rules and where they shouldn't to suit your post. You are ridiculous!

You don't understand the idea of "empathy" at all. You just think this just means presiding over a free for all. I guess we just disagree on this point Morgannwg! So it's ok to have the different opinion! and I respect yours certainly!

You clearly do not respect my opinion though. As I say Barnes had a faultless game in the NZ/France RWC quarter final in 2007 for you to then tell me I know nothing about the game at all. You also claim Rolland was correct to show Warbs a red card in that game from the RWC 2012, but you now say he should show more empathy and let NZ get away with murder at the breakdown and scrum. Some have said Rolland should have showed empathy to game of rugby and the world cup in his dismissal of the Wales captain, and you attacked them. So make your mind up!