Referees' dispute: No outcome

Some members of the South African Rugby Referees Association (SARRA) are at loggerheads with SARU's manager of referees, André Watson, and this has now come to a head at a meeting  with an independent arbitrator.

The result is that there was a hearing on Thursday and Friday of last week involving the arbitrator and members of the SARRA, including Watson and other members of the SARRA's staff and panel referees. At the heart of the matter is the unhappiness of some SARRA members with Watson's management over the 11 years that he has been in office.

There is as yet no official outcome to the meetings but the meetings are likely to be resumed at some stage this week and perhaps run over into next week.

SARU is unable to comment on the matter so far, Watson is not commenting and there is no comments from the SARRA members who are leading the dispute.