{"id":611603,"date":"2026-05-30T06:26:20","date_gmt":"2026-05-30T06:26:20","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/611603\/"},"modified":"2026-05-30T06:26:20","modified_gmt":"2026-05-30T06:26:20","slug":"ben-okeeffe-stands-by-springboks-penalty-call-that-ended-englands-world-cup","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/611603\/","title":{"rendered":"Ben O’Keeffe stands by Springboks’ penalty call that ended England’s World Cup"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"\"\/<\/a><\/p>\n

New Zealand referee Ben O\u2019Keeffe insists that he had a \u2018clear picture\u2019 when he awarded the Springboks a match-winning scrum penalty in the World Cup semi-final against England.<\/p>\n

Steve Borthwick\u2019s men held a 12-6 half-time lead during an intense last-four encounter, but Rassie Erasmus\u2019 charges fought their way back into the game through the boot of replacement fly-half Handre Pollard.<\/p>\n

Into the final 10 minutes of the semi-final, England<\/a> had a two-point advantage when the Springboks<\/a> had a feed to a scrum on the halfway line. After a few resets, referee O\u2019Keeffe<\/a> awarded a penalty to South Africa, and Pollard dissected the posts to put the Boks into a one-point lead and book their place in the final.<\/p>\n

Ellis Genge\u2019s verdict<\/p>\n

In a recent interview, England prop Ellis Genge, who was involved in that scrum, reflected on that decision, stating that he still has open wounds from the match.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe feeling after that semi of losing by a point and ultimately a penalty 40 metres out coming from our scrum, whether the decision was right or wrong. It hurts, like thanks for bringing that up. But yeah, so it\u2019s an open wound, and you just got to make sure it don\u2019t open back up,\u201d he told the Daily Mail.<\/p>\n

Asked why that was so wounding, he replied: \u201cIt\u2019s a f\u2013king World Cup<\/a>. It\u2019s a World Cup semi-final. The penalty for them to go ahead was from a scrum penalty that I was involved in, against me. So, obviously, it\u2019s going to make you feel a certain way, isn\u2019t it? Like you\u2019ve let the f\u2013king nation down.<\/p>\n

\u201cI ain\u2019t going to go into it. I don\u2019t want to f\u2013king reopen a can of worms, but you watch the scrums from that game and make your own mind up.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u2018Open wounds\u2019 from Springboks \u2018hammering\u2019 inspired England\u2019s improvement as Ellis Genge relishes \u2018most dominant pack ever\u2019 challenge<\/a><\/p>\n

Ben O\u2019Keeffe: Influencing the game in the right way<\/p>\n

O\u2019Keeffe has now given his verdict on that decisive call in what was the biggest game of his officiating career. The referee explained that officials prepare for making big calls like that one and insisted that he wanted to ensure that he got the correct decision and wanted a clear picture before blowing his whistle.<\/p>\n

\u201cI have a thing: a lot of referees do, with 10 minutes to go in a game when it\u2019s tight, I knew what the score was going to be. You have to make the correct decision, which is to blow your whistle. You also have to make the correct decision that you blow as well. So, you don\u2019t want to make an error,\u201d he told the DSPN podcast with Martin Devlin<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m very sharp in those last 10 minutes of a tight game. I think a lot of my games this season have been quite tight as well. You want to make sure that you are influencing or impacting the game in the right way so that the players win the game.\u201d<\/p>\n

Ben O\u2019Keeffe: \u2018I never want to referee a World Cup final if it meant the All Blacks could win it\u2019<\/a><\/p>\n

\u201cWe had a knee on the ground.\u201d<\/p>\n

Zoning in on the scrum call, he continued: \u201cMy understanding is that we had a scrum, we had an infringement by England, we had a few resets, and then you took the clear one. We had a knee on the ground.<\/p>\n

\u201cI made sure it was a really clear picture to give because I think if I didn\u2019t give it, and we go the other way, then obviously there\u2019s a really clear decision that I\u2019ve missed there.<\/p>\n

\u201cIn those moments, that\u2019s what you train for during the week to be really clear; you train for it during the whole season as well. So, big, big, big game to sort of come off on and to make that decision; I was pretty proud as well.\u201d<\/p>\n

READ MORE:\u00a0Springboks legends\u2019 dig at new Stormers recruit as Jean de Villiers wary of Sharks repeat with Siya Kolisi and Cheslin Kolbe signings<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"New Zealand referee Ben O\u2019Keeffe insists that he had a \u2018clear picture\u2019 when he awarded the Springboks a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":611604,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[35],"tags":[184383,309,348,3482,50,5903,8631,4247,101,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-611603","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-ben-o","tag-england","tag-home-page","tag-internationals","tag-news","tag-rugby","tag-rugby-world-cup","tag-south-africa","tag-sports","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/611603","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=611603"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/611603\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/611604"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=611603"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=611603"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=611603"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}