by Opinion will always be divided, but there seems to be a general consensus that Wayne Barnes is the best referee of our lifetimes. Now that he’s retired, he seems freer to speak his mind. The game would do well to pay attention.
He appeared on TNT’s highlights program for round one of the Champions Cup this month and gave his thoughts on the cards he and his teammates have had to fight with for many years now.
Related: The Breakdown | The Champions Cup emerges from the darkness of recent rugby to offer light
When asked how often he showed red cards to players who clearly had no intention of offending in the way they did – to whom he was showing the card because he had to – he did not answer he “every time”, but he did not give him a diplomatic answer. was clear. “I don’t think any player intentionally goes out to hurt another player,” he said. “I think players get it wrong.”
Another way to do that is because the game is too fast and too physical for any player to make sure they always get things right. So all we have to do about the protocols is guarantee that we will be promoting players. “The game needs to have that discussion,” Barnes said. “There were 112 cards in the Champions Cup last season. We have to ask ourselves – and this is a good time to ask it, just after the World Cup – do we always want to reduce teams to 14 or 13 men?”
Terrible words from the man who, a few months ago, red-carded the men’s first Rugby World Cup final in front of a global audience of millions, a year after the first game in the women’s equivalent. Sam Cane was the unfortunate scapegoat in the men’s event. But he is so willing to consider who he is.
Through the draw of split times and results, the bunker review official considered upgrading his offense from a yellow card to a red, while Siya Kolisi remained in the same game at yellow. It is said that Cane is the captain of the All Blacks and the opening flank. Kolisi captains the Springboks and the opening wing. This means they are two of the best defenders the game has seen.
We are all familiar by now with the comments of armchair critics who insist that players will “just learn to tackle lower”. If two of the best defenders the game has ever seen can’t guarantee they’ll never get a player in the head, no one can.
There are apologists who would have you believe that this era of the red card started as far back as the 2019 World Cup when the “high supporter sanctioning framework” was introduced. This was just a guideline to help referees achieve consistency (and help viewers work out what was going on). Anyway, in 2021 the “head contact process” was added. We might believe that red cards were invented for high tackles back then.
In real life, the protocol became official, with much stricter wording and less room for mitigation than now in place, on 3 January 2017, almost seven years ago, and the first red card followed, for Richard Barrington from Saracens, that weekend. . Unofficially the policy existed before that. In December 2016 there were nine red cards over two European weekends, when it later emerged that the referees had been quietly instructed as if the forthcoming protocols were already in place. Meanwhile, April 2015 was the first time the Breakdown discussed the problem of red cards for accidents, rather than deliberate crimes.
So the best players in the world had at least seven years to learn how to cope with inferiors. Still the red cards keep coming. And they will never stop, until this persecution subsides, because there are no intentional offenses, nor can they be avoided.
There is a lot of evidence to suggest that players are struggling with lower. Gone is the cult of the “big hit”, that loud smash that was celebrated by the entire rugby community just 15 years or so ago. It’s not great anymore – and that’s definitely a positive development. It didn’t make a single difference to the frequency of concussions, nor will it, but it was ugly to celebrate a big win in a game whose purpose was to put the interests of the players first.
We didn’t need to send one player out to make that change. Education and training are the biggest inputs, and an actual law change would help to support it too, lowering the legal height of a tackle from shoulder height, where it has always remained, to something like the armpit or sternum. The number of penalties dropped is better than one more red card in the event of an accident.
Cane sat with his head in his hands when the news of his red card came through that fateful night, just like Tom Curry (England openside, one of the best defenders the game has seen, etc, etc) on the open weekend. the competition. What should have been Cane’s greatest night was ruined, as the credibility of the sport was an event of excellence. Lydia Thompson has spoken poignantly about how the red card she was shown in the women’s final nearly derailed her.
These are the people the sport is cheating on. Rugby is dangerous at elite level and never will be. Retrospective justice cannot work after ugly accidents. The referees are not in armchairs. They are at the heart of the action in this fast-paced sport. They can see that these players mean no harm, and they don’t like to send them out. Let the words of May Barnes carry the weight.
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