The British and Irish Lions have scored a controversial last-gasp try to beat the Wallabies 29-26 in a thrilling Test match at the MCG.<\/p>\n
In the shadows of full-time and in front of 90,307 spectators, reserve Lions back-rower Jac Morgan cleared out Wallabies counterpart Carlo Tizzano at a ruck, a phase before the tourists scored a try through fullback Hugo Keenan.<\/p>\n
Keenan’s try, with only 50 seconds left on the clock, clinched victory and gave the Lions an unassailable 2-0 series lead.<\/p>\n
Morgan appeared to make contact with Tizzano’s neck, triggering Wallabies captain Harry Wilson \u2014 whose side was leading 26-24 at the time of the incident \u2014 to plead with referee Andrea Piardi to review the play.<\/p>\n
Wilson believed it was an illegal clear-out from Morgan when Tizzano was attempting to pilfer the ball after the Lions’ James Ryan was tackled five metres out from the Wallabies’ goal line.<\/p>\n
Following consultation with television match official Eric Gauzins, Piardi ruled Tizzano and Morgan arrived at the ruck at “the same time” but there was “no foul play”, meaning the try stood.<\/p>\n
Sitting alongside a shattered Wilson at their post-match media conference, Schmidt claimed Morgan’s actions were a violation of World Rugby’s laws relating to dangerous play at a ruck.<\/p>\n
Schmidt pointed to law 9.20, the crux of which states a “player must not make contact with an opponent above the line of the shoulders”.<\/p>\n
“I think everyone can make their own decision on that,” Schmidt said.<\/p>\n
“You just have to read law 9.20 and I guess you just have to listen to the description from the referee and then watch the vision.<\/p>\n
“When two players are described as arriving at the same time \u2014 just watch the footage.”<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Carlo Tizzano needed treatment following the incident with Jac Morgan. (Getty Images: Morgan Hancock)<\/p>\n
Schmidt said he could understand match officials making errors “because they’re human”.<\/p>\n
But he believed Piardi’s interpretation of the incident contradicted World Rugby’s well-publicised edict on player safety.<\/p>\n
“Our perspective is we felt it was a decision that doesn’t really live up to the big player safety push that they’re [World Rugby] talking about,” Schmidt said.<\/p>\n
“You cannot hit someone above the level of the shoulders and there’s no bind with the left arm [from Morgan]. The hand is on the ground.<\/p>\n
“That’s what we’ve seen and we’ve watched a number of replays from different angles, so it is what it is.<\/p>\n
“We just have to accept it.”<\/p>\n
Wilson said the incident warranted a penalty, which would have meant Keenan’s try was disallowed.<\/p>\n
“Obviously I saw shoulder to the neck,” Wilson said.<\/p>\n
“Carlo was pretty sore after it and he was straight down, so I went to him [Piardi] about that and got told since he [Morgan] wrapped his arms [around Tizzano], it was all good to be in the neck.”<\/p>\n
Schmidt said the Wallabies were “gutted” but he was “immensely proud” of their effort, having led for almost the entire match.<\/p>\n
Farrell backs referee’s decision<\/p>\n
Not surprisingly, triumphant Lions coach Andy Farrell saw the incident differently to Schmidt.<\/p>\n
Farrell felt Morgan’s clear-out was legal.<\/p>\n
“I thought it was a good clear-out live,” he said.<\/p>\n
“I couldn’t understand what he [Piardi] was going back for. They seem to go back for everything these days, don’t they?<\/p>\n
“But I’m so pleased the referee held his nerve.”<\/p>\n
When Wilson was remonstrating with Piardi, Lions captain Maro Itoje rushed in to confront the Wallabies skipper.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Maro Itoje (centre) tried to intervene as Harry Wilson (right) spoke to referee Andrea Piardi. (Getty Images: Morgan Hancock)<\/p>\n
Itoje agreed with Farrell’s assessment of Morgan’s clear-out.<\/p>\n
“Naturally, their captain was trying to get their point across and trying \u2014 in my view \u2014 argue for something that didn’t happen,” Itoje said.<\/p>\n
“I guess I was arguing for something that did happen.<\/p>\n
“Fortunately, Jac was accurate with what he was doing and everything was fine.”<\/p>\n
Lions fly-half Finn Russell was in the vicinity of the ruck when Morgan made contact with Tizzano.<\/p>\n
“They [Wallabies] had boys over the ball and Jac just cleared them out \u2026 it was a hard clear-out, that’s all it is,” Russell said.<\/p>\n
“I think he [Tizzano] obviously popped up holding his head as if it’s illegal, which it wasn’t.”<\/p>\n
The Lions tour will wrap up in Sydney next Saturday night with the third Test at Stadium Australia.<\/p>\n
The Wallabies had lost the series opener in Brisbane last weekend, going down 27-19 to the Lions.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A furious Wallabies coach Joe Schmidt feels his side was the victim of an unfair refereeing decision during…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":24409,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[24096,1380,64,63,1378,24093,24094,24092,1381,24095,18021,24097,760,2633,18978,85,2500],"class_list":["post-24408","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-sports","tag-andrea-piardi","tag-andy-farrell","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-british-and-irish-lions","tag-carlo-tizzano","tag-harry-wilson","tag-jac-morgan","tag-joe-schmidt","tag-maro-itoje","tag-mcg","tag-referee","tag-rugby","tag-rugby-union","tag-second-test","tag-sports","tag-wallabies"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24408","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=24408"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/24408\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/24409"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=24408"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=24408"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=24408"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}