Video is killing the rugby experience

IN ALL FAIRNESS

Video replay was supposed to improve the sporting experience to ensure key decisions are gotten right to protect the integrity of competitions but is increasingly becoming anything but.

Rugby, both league and union, are largely seen as the bastions for the fourth-official, video referee, or whatever you want to call them, particularly when it was restricted to confirming whether a try was scored or not. That’s effectively black and white and hard to get wrong, the same with soccer.

However, since video replay was extended into the area of foul play, it has led to many more issues as making a decision on this is subjective and can lead to inconsistencies which is leading to a growing clamour for video replay to be removed in certain circumstances.

‘Big Brother’ in the form of the television camera is causing issues in rugby, particularly when it comes to high tackles, but it is going too far. I am all for player safety but some of the rules that have been brought in to deter such tackles, are too draconian, and impacting the game in a negative way. It came to the fore again last Saturday with Tadhg Beirne’s third minute dismissal for Ireland against New Zealand in the test match in Chicago. Beirne’s shoulder made contact with the head of Beauden Barrett, and to the letter of the law, merited a sanction but a red card it was not.

The problem with video replay dealing with foul play is it largely decided on slow motion. Rugby is not played in slow motion, and when the incident happened in real time, it looked more accidental than anything else, something backed up by Beauden Barrett afterwards in defence of the Munster man.

The issue with professional rugby at the moment is any contact with the head seems to be an automatic card of some kind. The crusade against the head high tackles over the last decade or so hasn’t reduced the instances of them occurring, it is impossible as rugby is too physical a game where some element of head contact is unavoidable. Yes, really dangerous play needs to be dealt with, but there are many instances where high tackles are just rugby incidents and should be refereed as such. It’s the same with tackling in the air or interfering with a line-out, there are now too many reasons for a referee to blow the whistle than there used to be, and it is impacting on the flow and ultimately the quality of the game, such as last Saturday night’s high-profile match which was largely uninspiring for large parts.

It is why I find club rugby more appealing as there is no video referee to get involved. The referee is the man in charge and has to make all the decisions, with the help of their touch-judges. In the professional game, too many of the referees are absolving themselves of the responsibility of dealing with discipline, immediately issuing a yellow card and crossing his harms to indicate the bunker to look at it further if a greater penalty is required. This, when it was introduced only a few years ago, was meant as a good thing to speed up games and take away the delays of the referee adjudicating it via the big screen, but I would much prefer the referee on the field to deal with it as they have the feel for the game, rather than a referee sitting in the comfort of a television production truck.

Whether Tadhg Beirne’s presence on the field for longer would have made a huge difference in terms of the result but the pessimism around Irish rugby remains off the back of another performance which lacked a cutting edge to turn their greater possession and territory into points. There are many reasons as to why but the absence of Johnny Sexton remains the most keenly felt of all. He will go down as an Irish rugby immortal and why he remained the best out-half we had at the age of 38.

The unfortunate thing for anyone following him is that his boots are hard to fill. He saw the game in a way only special players can. Jack Crowley and Sam Prendergast are still young as international out-halves, and it can’t be forgotten that it wasn’t until he was in his mid to late twenties that Sexton made the number 10 jersey his own. His battle with Ronan O’Gara was important in that, mentally toughening himself, and the hope is Crowley, Prendergast, or anyone else that will come through in the coming years, will challenge each other to improve, from which Ireland will ultimately benefit. It’s why I get annoyed every time I hear the Crowley v Prendergast debate as to who is better; what Ireland need are both, one to start and create the platform for the other to come on and win a game, largely without the team missing a beat in terms of standard. In what order they play, who cares!