A refereeing Odyssey for two
South African referees Mark Lawrence and Craig Joubert, two of the top men in the world, left Johannesburg on Monday on a refereeing Odyssey that will take them to three continents in three weeks.
Their first appoint is to the Bledisloe Cup match, Australia vs New Zealand, in Tokyo on Saturday with Lawrence to referee and Joubert as an assistant. Then they head for Cardiff where Joubert referees Wales vs New Zealand and Lawrence assists The Saturday after that they are in Tunis for a World Cup qualifier between Tunisia and Namibia, Lawrence as referee and Joubert as assistant.
They both flew from Johannesburg. Lawrence got their by car from Standerton, Joubert by air from Durban. Then the long trek started.
The distances are as follows:
Johannesburg – Hong Kong: 10713 km
Hong Kong – Tokyo: 2854
Tokyo – London: 9583 km
London Tunis: 1823 km
Tunis – London: 1823 km
London – Johannesburg: 9062.
Then Lawrence drives the 170 km home and Joubert flies the 538 km to Durban.
Together in the air, each will have travelled 35 848 km. The circumference of the earth is only 4228 km longer!
Forget all about the time getting to and from the airport, including going down the M4 from Heathrow to Cardiff and back. Look at just the airtime on the main part of the journey.
Johannesburg – Hong Kong: 13 hrs 10 mins
Hong Kong – Tokyo: 4 hrs 25 mins
Tokyo – London: 11 hrs 25 mins
London Tunis: 2 hrs 30 mins
Tunis – London: 2 hrs 30 mins
London – Johannesburg: 11 hrs
That is 33 hrs 35 minutes.
That is much less than it took Odysseus to get home from Troy to Ithaca but more than three days’ work.
Their tickets – just air, not hotel and so on, are roughly R50 000 – each. It doesn’t look so bad in other currencies – US$6 700, GB£4 100, €4 500.
The ancient practice of appointing local referees was cheaper!
