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'Rassie should be commended': Support for Erasmus as hearing nears

By Liam Heagney
(Photo by David Rogers/Getty Images)

South Africa director of rugby Rassie Erasmus is preparing to step into the World Rugby dock with a ringing endorsement from ex-Springboks boss Ian McIntosh, who feels Erasmus should be commended for last month’s spectacular refereeing outburst and a committee formed to revise contradictory laws which he feels have made a nonsense of the sport. 

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It was July 29, two days before the second Springboks versus Lions Test match in Cape Town, when the infamous 62-minute Erasmus tirade regarding the first Test level of officiating became public two days after it was initially filmed.

The scattergun outburst eventually led to World Rugby issuing a misconduct charge against Erasmus and SA Rugby on August 2 that is expected to be held virtually in the coming weeks after the Springboks fly out to Australia on Thursday to play the remainder of the 2021 Rugby Championship. Submissions are still being awaited from SA Rugby and a hearing date (if required) will then be set.

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Erasmus’ heavy-handed criticism cast a cloud over the three-match Lions series and it is believed that the four home unions that comprise the Lions as well as Australia, the country where first Test referee Nic Berry hails from, want World Rugby to come down heavily on the Springboks director.

However, there are others who have been sympathetic to the headline-making rant by the South Africa rugby boss, including McIntosh who coached the Springboks for two years after they were welcomed back into the Test level fold post-apartheid in the early 1990s. 

Speaking in an interview published on iol.co.za, McIntosh claimed: “It is not for me to say whether Rassie used the correct channels but I do feel that something had to be done to gain the attention of the officials because the game has become far too complicated and a stop-start affair.

“It has been spoilt for players, coaches and the spectators. The game has become over-officiated because of too many ‘provisions’ being added each year to the laws. Instead of World Rugby disciplining Rassie, he should be commended and a committee established to revise the laws which are too many, contradictory, and in some cases, nonsensical.

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“Can someone respectfully inform World Rugby that the laws were intended to keep the game flowing, not stop it, and that the referee should become No31 on the field again and not No1.

“Our very own Dr Danie Craven, a doyen of world rugby, was involved in writing half the laws and he once said that behind every law should be written in brackets ‘But don’t blow it if the infringement doesn’t stop play from continuing’.

“Yet referees seem hell-bent on looking for penalties instead of letting the game go. How else is it possible for an average of 25-30 penalties to be dished out in a game? The old adage of blow the game and not the law has gone out the window.

“And just knowing the laws doesn’t make a referee. It’s about how they are applied that is the difference between a good and bad referee, like a good fly-half who knows how to read the game and to use the ball accordingly.”

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J
Jon 9 hours ago
Jake White: Are modern rugby players actually better?

This is the problem with conservative mindsets and phycology, and homogenous sports, everybody wants to be the same, use the i-win template. Athlete wise everyone has to have muscles and work at the gym to make themselves more likely to hold on that one tackle. Do those players even wonder if they are now more likely to be tackled by that player as a result of there “work”? Really though, too many questions, Jake. Is it better Jake? Yes, because you still have that rugby of ole that you talk about. Is it at the highest International level anymore? No, but you go to your club or checkout your representative side and still engage with that ‘beautiful game’. Could you also have a bit of that at the top if coaches encouraged there team to play and incentivized players like Damian McKenzie and Ange Capuozzo? Of course we could. Sadly Rugby doesn’t, or didn’t, really know what direction to go when professionalism came. Things like the state of northern pitches didn’t help. Over the last two or three decades I feel like I’ve been fortunate to have all that Jake wants. There was International quality Super Rugby to adore, then the next level below I could watch club mates, pulling 9 to 5s, take on the countries best in representative rugby. Rugby played with flair and not too much riding on the consequences. It was beautiful. That largely still exists today, but with the world of rugby not quite getting things right, the picture is now being painted in NZ that that level of rugby is not required in the “pathway” to Super Rugby or All Black rugby. You might wonder if NZR is right and the pathway shouldn’t include the ‘amateur’, but let me tell you, even though the NPC might be made up of people still having to pull 9-5s, we know these people still have dreams to get out of that, and aren’t likely to give them. They will be lost. That will put a real strain on the concept of whether “visceral thrill, derring-do and joyful abandon” type rugby will remain under the professional level here in NZ. I think at some point that can be eroded as well. If only wanting the best athlete’s at the top level wasn’t enough to lose that, shutting off the next group, or level, or rugby players from easy access to express and showcase themselves certainly will. That all comes back around to the same question of professionalism in rugby and whether it got things right, and rugby is better now. Maybe the answer is turning into a “no”?

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