Lions request non-SA refs
The Lions have requested that the referees for all their matches, not just the Test matches, be refereed by non-South Africans on their tour to South Africa in 2009.
It is a request, not a part of their tour contract, just a request.
That would exclude four of the top referees in the world – Jonathan Kaplan, Mark Lawrence, Craig Joubert and Marius Jonker.
André Watson, the boss of South Africa’s referees, hopes that the request will be turned down. He said: “We would like to give the Lions the best referees available, and four of the top referees in the world are South Africans. We have the best and can give them the best.
“If we could not have given them the best I’d’ve been the first to put my hand up to say that we could not do it, but we can give them the best.
“We do not doubt their integrity or impartiality. We need to judge on competence and merit – whether people can do the job.
“For the referees, too, it is a great opportunity which has become a rare one with so few tours. The last tour was in 1997 and that was also a Lions’ tour.”
The IRB’s top panel of referees is:
Wayne Barnes (England), Christophe Berdos (France), Bryce Lawrence (New Zealand), George Clancy (Ireland), Stuart Dickinson (Australia), Matt Goddard (Australia), Marius Jonker (South Africa), Craig Joubert (South Africa), Joël Jutge (France), Jonathan Kaplan (South Africa), Mark Lawrence (South Africa), Alan Lewis (Ireland), Nigel Owens (Wales), Dave Pearson (England), Alain Rolland (Ireland), Steve Walsh (New Zealand), Chris White (England).
This group has been thinned with the retirements of Paul Honiss and Lyndon Bray of New Zealand.
If the Lions’ principle of neutrality were observed the following referees in this group would be ineligible: Wayne Barnes, George Clancy, Alan Lewis, Nigel Owens, Dave Pearson, Alain Rolland and Chris White because they are from the unions which make up the Lions and Marius Jonker, Craig Joubert, Jonathan Kaplan and Mark Lawrence because they are South Africans.
That leaves available to referee the Lions on their tour the Frenchmen, whom the Lions would probably like because they are playmates in the Heineken Cup and so on, the Australians and the New Zealanders – Christophe Berdos, Bryce Lawrence, Stuart Dickinson, Matt Goddard, Joël Jutge and Steve Walsh. Of them Jutge has not refereed for quite some time because of injury and Walsh has been off for a while though is due back in November.
It means that 11 referees are ineligible and 6 eligible. The six may not be the best of the 17 but it seems that the Lions are so suspicious of the honesty of the referees that they would rather have “neutrality” than competence.
It would be sad if so long before the tour refereeing becomes an issue.
It is also sad if guests start laying down to their hosts what they want for tea, what kind of tea, where the cream for the scones must come from, who will bake the scones and where they are willing to sit in which parlour.
Already their conditions have ruled out Newlands as a Test venue for the first time on a Lions’ tour since 1891.
