SEAN O’BRIEN WAS unhappy that some of Steffon Armitage’s “illegal” breakdown play was missed by referee Wayne Barnes during Leinster’s defeat to Toulon in the Champions Cup semi-finals.
While the openside flanker admitted that the match official had a tough job during Sunday’s encounter in Marseille, he also stated that Barnes can be difficult to communicate with during games.
Armitage had a telling impact on the game after appearing off the bench in the 36th minute to replace South African back row Juan Smith, who departed with a knee injury.
The English openside flanker won three turnovers on the deck, adding to his pre-existing tournament tally of 15, the most by an individual player.
“Yeah, well it’s completely illegal,” said Leinster’s O’Brien this afternoon in UCD when asked about Armitage’s influence. “You know, there was three instances where he’s completely illegal, his elbows were on the ground actually.
He’s so short, the pictures the referees are seeing, if you look back on the video, is actually a good picture. But when you go into the finer details of it, it’s hard in the moment to try and get that right.
“He is very strong, so when he gets over the ball he’s very hard to shift, him and Chris Masoe. That’s one of the things we have to try, I’ve said it before, we have to take the ref out of the equation. Myself included, I missed a barrel one time on him and was there that second too late.”
When asked by The42 whether Leinster had looked to flag the issues around Armitage with referee Barnes during the game, O’Brien said:
“No, you can’t say anything to that man. He’s not open to any kind of feedback, we’ve learned that in the past. So it was just one of those things where you get on with it and try and sort it out yourselves.”
O’Brien was frustrated with Barnes’ refereeing in Ireland’s Six Nations clash with Wales this year too, when the English match official was particularly stringent against Ireland at the breakdown and ruck area.
Asked why Barnes was making what O’Brien perceives to be wrong decisions, the Tullow Tank said he is unsure:
“That’s a good question, it’s not for me to answer though. That’s for him to answer, or assessors to answer. That’s out of our control so we can’t comment on that. It’s a difficult job that he has and I don’t have answers to that.”
When The42 quizzed O’Brien as to whether pre-match channels for discussing relevant issues with referees were being used, he said such measures often make no difference, before going on to admit that Barnes’ job is a difficult one.
There is that, but once the game starts he’ll make his own mind up regardless,” said O’Brien. “Referees do that, regardless of what you say. The ref will have his mind made up, he knows who’s good at poaching and who’s not so good at poaching.
“He sees a picture on the field, as I said, and he mightn’t see the first instance of whether it’s a penalty or not.
“It’s difficult for refs as well, I’m not putting it on him. They have a job to do and we have to take the ref out of the equation and make sure we’re not half a yard off, or half a second off, and make sure we’re lower on the clean out.
“That’s stuff we’ll be looking at moving forward.”
Sounds worrying
@geraldo: he has a point about thr penalty count. When your winning handy enough there’s no excuse to give away penalties.
Hard to stay disciplined and motivated if you are winning by 50pts. The big problem is the overlap with international windows. It effectively means each club has to have two teams. If there were fewer games it would be more competitive. A pool or conference system is the only way to go without asking unions to reduce the number of teams they have.
@Rudiger McMonihan: few clubs lose a whole team to the international windows. Maybe one in each country would lose 15. I think a 2 division league might work but as soon as the SA teams come in it would be them and the 3 Irish sides. So maybe not.
@Chris Mc: I think this year you need to include all four provinces. If Connacht had played all their games they would be second in conference B.
@Chris Mc: no union will ever have relagation, would the FIR, WRU or IRFU risk one or more of their professional teams being 2nd division teams? Glasgow, Edinburgh, Zebre, Benetton lose as many players as Leinster to international call ups and have nowhere near the same resources. Its little surprise Leinster are walking it against those teams.
@Rudiger McMonihan: think we touched on this before, clubs need the 10/11 home games. The proposed new rugby calendar if it gets agreed will sort it out. With no overlap durning internationals. It has a 29/30 week club season, but I think it would be the end of the HCup. As the French Top 14 takes 29 weeks and if given the choice between changing their league system or leaving the HCup the French would leave the HCup. The Pro 16 and English Prem would have maybe 5 weeks that they could fit a new European rugby cup in (Current HCup, takes 9 weeks), but no way can the French fit in a 29 round league and 9 round HCup in 30 weeks, and if there are no French is it really worth it?
@Kingshu: yeah I said they need to reduce the number of club games. Pre-covid Super rugby teams played far fewer games (16 + 3 knock outs). The best players go on to play internationals after (14 in a normal year). Then the rest play in the mitre cup (10 + 2 KO’s). So everyone gets game time, the calendar is more coherent and the games are more competitive. The way our calendar is set up is ridiculous. There is so much overlap between pro14, Heineken cup and internationals. We bounce between the 3 all year too. Teams dont get enough time together to build momentum and their position on the table is often down to how well their 3rd or 4th choice player is.
@Rudiger McMonihan: The New global calendar proposal
Is
Autumn internationals: October-November
Club and European games: December-July with a 7 week break for
Six Nations: April-May and same time the Rugby Championship: April-May. Players get a break from end of July to start of Oct.
Thats a 30 week club season with 7 week break with no games played durning 6 nations/rugbt championship. I just can’t see the Top 14 fitting their league and Hcup into that window.
@Con Cussed: have they not lost 2 games so far. They are a bit off the top 3 to be fair.
@Kingshu: I am with you on this. The system that has been cobbled together over the years has suited the Irish set-up more than anyone else; its deficiencies are increasingly obvious but it is hard to see that there will be changes that will be beneficial in the round.
The underlying problem is that there are only 2 countries – England and France – with the resources to support a domestic professional ‘club’ set-up. The rest have to rely on subsidies from the mens’ senior international game and an artificial cobbled-together league combining the remaining countries.
For us the real focus of the ‘club’ game is the Heineken Cup, but this can only really exist if the English and French clubs want it to, and only a minority of them are really committed