It’s something we all dread in rugby – your team has just broken through on your own 22m line, a couple of 15m passes are thrown and, involving a prop somewhere in the exchange, your whippet-sized half-back goes over in the corner carrying the opposing fullback on his legs. But before the ref throws his arm to the sky and takes a big puff on the whistle, he makes that feared shape with his hands to signal involvement from the third match official (TMO).
After 5 minutes of rewinding and fast forwarding and deciding whether your hooker held on too long to the opposing lock at the ruck in your own 22 three phases before the 80m run, the TMO takes play back to the 22 and awards a penalty to the other team.
Sound familiar?
In Saturday’s Super Rugby playoff between the Highlanders and the Chiefs in Dunedin, the Highlanders made a magnificent break from inside their own half followed by a storming run up the touch line by their hooker. Then Lima Sopoaga, their fly-half made a pin point accurate cross kick to their winger who went over in the corner to cap off the electric play…
The referee went to the TMO and after 3-4 minutes of looking at replays, the try was disallowed as one of the players to offload was deemed to brush the sideline very very marginally – so marginally that the commentators disagreed with the call and it came down to benefit of the doubt.
There’s no evidence to suggest that the evolution of technology has had a detrimental affect on rugby as a game but as far as general play goes, the TMO is having far too much impact on the game and its outcomes. Extrapolate the aforementioned scenario to the World Cup semi final or final and the TMO will threaten to turn the game into a farce.
The issue raised it’s ugly head during the 2014/2015 northern hemisphere rugby season and for fear of getting a decision slightly wrong, referees are now opting to go for the third match official far more often.
What can be done about it?
Introduction of by-laws that alleviate the TMO’s influence can be two-fold and can work with finer policing of the game by the on-field referees.
1. Only allow the game to be taken back one phase after a try is scored.
This means that errors by teams could only be revisited by the TMO in the last phase. This is not rugby league and there are three referees on the field which is plenty. It is not, nor should it be the TMO’s responsibility to police small errors that occurred during general play 5 or 6 phases earlier.
2. Limit the amount of replays that the TMO is afforded to five per referral.
If you’re not going to spot a mistake, an error or an illegality after five replays than then there’s nothing to suggest that you’re going to spot any after 10 replays, stop wasting time, make a call and move on.
Rugby’s laws are so fluid and so ingrained into the game that if you slow it down, almost any act could look illegal for example; many passes in the game are actually propelled forward but it is players’ momentum moving forward that makes the ball look like it’s going backward… Also in the past month, Super Rugby referees have had a knack of referring tries scored through rolling mauls to the TMO with many being found to be illegal.
As the game continues to allow developing technology to change the face of the game, TMO, “ref-cam” etc, then it’s inevitable that the laws of rugby will become further diluted and murky. However with the ruling bodies attempting to make the game of rugby more watchable and fan friendly – the last thing we need are pedantic and ostentatious third match officials far too willing to make an impression on the game.