Law Discussion: Downward pressure
Shaun Venter of the Free State Cheetahs breaks sharply down the middle of the field. Blue Bulls close in and he chips ahead about 42 metres out and the ball bounces towards the Blue Bulls' goal posts. Jamba Ulenga of the Blue Bulls leads the chase with Francois Hougaard of the Blue Bulls and Raymond Rhule of the Free State close behind with Venter just behind those three. Ulenga misses the ball. Hougaard and Rhule dive for the ball and Hougaard knocks the ball back with his hand towards his goal-line. Behind them Venter dives and ends with the ball in the Blue Bulls' in-goal as Warrick Gelant tries to stop him. Gelant immediately indicates to the referee that there was a knock-on.
The referee refers the matter to the TMO and something of a debate ensues. The referee believes that it was a try, the TMO that Venter knocked the ball. He makes a point that Venter was not a ball carrier and that he did not exert downward pressure. The commentators note that he touched the ball with the back of his hand.
Law 22.1 GROUNDING The BALL
There are two ways a player can ground the ball:
(a) Player touches the ground with the ball. A player grounds the ball by holding the ball and touching the ground with it, in in-goal. ‘Holding’ means holding in the hand or hands, or in the arm or arms. No downward pressure is required.
(b) Player presses down on the ball. A player grounds the ball when it is on the ground in the in-goal and the player presses down on it with a hand or hands, arm or arms, or the front of the player’s body from waist to neck inclusive.
(a) does not apply because Venter is not holding the ball, But what about (b)
The law says nothing about which part of the hand must press down on the ball. It does not matter if it is palm of back of hand.
It is quite possible to exert downward pressure with the back of the hand. (You can experiment with that and be surprised how much pressure you can exert with the back of your hand.)
The law does not say how much pressure must be applied. The back of Venter's hand certainly makes contact with the ball while the ball is on the ground and in contact with the goal-line. It is hard to imagine that such contact would exert no pressure on the ball at all. What happens to the ball after the moment when hand, ball and ground are in contact is irrelevant. The try will have been scored by them. Any knock-on would have had to have occurred before the hand-ball-ground contact.
It may just have been that this should have been a try and that the referee's question should rather have been the second one – 'Give me a reason not to award a try.'
It's a tough decision but in this case it may well have been a wrong one. And the decision is finally the referee's, not the TMO's, and the referee had (good?) reason to award the try.
