More fundamentally, as with VAR in football, endless video referrals alienate fans and professional coaches alike. Take Stephen Larkham, head coach of the Brumbies, who believes lessons need to be learned from the Fiji game. “It was certainly frustrating watching at home,” the former Wallabies’ World Cup-winning fly-half told the Guardian on Monday. “I was like everyone else in Australia. Particularly Tom Wright’s forward pass for that Wallaby ‘try’ down the right edge … they replayed it maybe 20 times. I think everyone wants them to make a decision and move on. If the TMO comes in that’s fine but make a quicker decision.” The irony here is that World Rugby implemented a global law trial at the start of the year meant to reduce the power of the TMO and to concentrate only on “clear and obvious” offences in the last two phases of play (or the last attacking passage of play comprising at least two phases). So much for that objective. Ladle on top of that the reviews around high tackles and the amount of dead time during games is not greatly diminishing. This is not encouraging news in the fight to make the sport more watchable and attract more viewers. “We’re searching for that in Super Rugby and you’d like to think we’re doing the same in the Test arena,” Larkham said. “There are heaps of people watching on TV and we’d like the game to be as quick as possible.” The Waratahs coach, Dan McKellar, also feels that the push this year for swifter decision-making in Super Rugby should be a priority in the forthcoming Test series. The Lions head coach, Andy Farrell, is slightly more circumspect. “We want the right decision, I don’t think anyone wants to see a stop start game, everyone wants to see continuity,” he said. “But in any given game there might be some decisions that need to be referred. Getting the balance is key.” True enough. But this is also about more than simply waiting for a handful of wearisome in-game interludes to play out. Ultimately it is about how rugby wants to see – and sell – itself: as a sport played and officiated by human beings or as some kind of alien computer game? It is a shared dilemma, of course. Cricket, football and tennis are wrestling with similar scenarios, the key difference being that rugby’s law-book contains more shades of grey than the rest put together. “Clear and obvious” should mean precisely that, the external chatter in referees’ ears needs reducing and TMO interventions should be limited to the act of scoring/ball grounding and serious thuggery. While some still grumble about the somewhat bizarre end to the 2017 Lions series, when Romain Poite originally awarded a penalty to the All Blacks only to change his mind after a chat with the Lions captain, Sam Warburton, at least that did not involve endless on-field replays and protracted frame-by-frame analysis. Those who want every rugby decision to be perfectly black and white – or to be pored over in slow motion to the nth degree – need to see the bigger picture. Rooms with a view Australia has some fine stadiums and it was a pleasure to be shown around the Allianz Stadium and the evocative Sydney Cricket Ground at the end of last week. The former cost A$828m (£395m) to rebuild and, give or take the playing surface which is set to be relaid, it is a wonderful place to watch sport. So, too, is the SCG where, up above the door of the home dressing room, is a famous signed message from Don Bradman, written in 1928: “If it’s difficult I’ll do it now. If it’s impossible I’ll do it presently.” For anyone who happens to be in Sydney and fancies taking a tour themselves, further details are available here and here. |