Owen Doyle believes that Wales were hard done by in the losses to Scotland and Ireland in the Six Nations.
The former director of referees at the IRFU has urged fans to ‘remove the green-tinted glasses’ and admit that the officiating team that oversaw the round four clash in Dublin favoured the hosts.
He believes that Steve Tandy’s men have reason to feel aggrieved by refereeing inconsistencies after a heroic defeat to the Irish.
Ireland enjoyed the lion’s share of possession during the match with Wales, making well over 200 tackles, with flanker Alex Mann leading the charge with a personal tally of over 30.
Wales were hard done by
Ultimately, it was not enough as they succumbed to their 13th successive defeat in the Six Nations and according to Doyle, without any help from the officials.
“Wales deserved better from the match officials, in both matches,” Doyle wrote in his Irish Times column, referencing the loss to Scotland and Ireland.
“Scotland’s late winning try followed a blatant illegal maul entry by their number eight, Matt Fagerson. He drove into the maul in front of the try scorer, George Turner, and contributed immensely to splitting open the Welsh defence. This happened bang in front of assistant Karl Dickson, who must have missed it completely. TMO Ian Tempest also remained silent and with referee Matthew Carley static and unsighted, the try was awarded. Talk about big moments.”
The former international referee did not hold back in his criticism of English official Dickson, who was in charge of the Friday night fixture in Dublin.
“I imagine if Wales don’t see him again for aeons, it will be all too soon,” he continued.
“When the dust settled after Jamie Osborne had touched down, we saw Welsh scrumhalf Tomos Williams was in the sinbin. His illegal interference didn’t have much effect in slowing Ireland’s attack and the try came moments later. There were questions, too, about a potential forward pass from Jacob Stockdale in the build-up to the try, but nothing was clear and obvious enough for the officials to call it.
“So, a tough decision on Williams, but, more to the point, it was completely inconsistent with how the referee had dealt with several Irish infringements in the first half while well inside their own 22. His penalty-only warning was a benign sanction, with captain Caelan Doris undoubtedly grateful that Dickson decided against a yellow. Go compare, as the saying goes.
“There was also lots of chat about Jack Conan’s try. My immediate reaction was that Rónan Kelleher, marginally in front of Conan, had blocked the defender. Dickson deemed the try should stand, but I am with those who say Kelleher’s action was not legal.
“During any 80 minutes of test rugby, the majority of the referee’s job is relatively straightforward. It’s only when the chips are really down that they’re called upon to sort out the difficult, the tight, the knife-edge issues. These are where the officials really earn their corn.”
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Tandy isn’t blaming the officials
Speaking after the match, head coach Tandy would not blame the officials for the final result but did say that his side isn’t getting the ‘rub of the green at the minute’ as they attempt to build a reputation as a disciplined team.
“You look at the penalty count away from home, it’s 13-7. We only conceded seven with 280 tackles. For us, we feel we have to build that reputation, and again it is something we are working tirelessly at,” he said.
“You look at how much Ireland threw at us. There are always things we will want to go back to, but there’s other things in the game that we could have still added more to it.
“I’m not going to go into the ins and outs of that. We came away from home and we are building more of a reputation in and around that penalty count.
“It was there to see in the autumn how many penalties we gave away and against England, so we need to continue to build that reputation.”