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Ref's comedy of errors goes All Blacks' way
Greg Growden | November 3, 2008
WHEN the Bledisloe Cup teams headed to Sha Tin racecourse on Wednesday for a night on the punt, the Wallabies thought they had it all over the All Blacks.
The All Blacks put on their traditional grim, brick-with-eyes persona and retreated to a corner of the Hong Kong Jockey Club members' function room and kept to themselves. The Wallabies thought: "Great … they're jumping at shadows."
The All Blacks' uncommunicative nature continued during the week, prompting complaints from the local officials, who were trying to sell Hong Kong as the next big Test venue. In contrast, the Wallabies were all over town, promoting the game.
On to game day and the Wallabies again thought they had it all over the All Blacks.
The siege mentality within the All Blacks camp had become so intense that even a request from New Zealand's Radio Sport for one of the players, who was not involved in the game, to be an expert commentator during the live call was fobbed off. Instead, Wallabies prop Ben Alexander gladly put on the headphones and gave the Kiwis an unexpected Australian perspective on the game.
And at half-time in the Test, the Wallabies believed they had it all over the All Blacks.
The All Blacks were surprisingly sluggish early on, struggling to keep up with the Wallabies, who were using width and pace, and through excellent ball-in-hand play went ahead with two Drew Mitchell tries.
Yet even as the Wallabies trotted into the dressing rooms at half-time boasting a 14-9 lead, there were ominous signs. The most worrying concerned the man with the whistle.
When it was first announced that Irish referee Alan Lewis would be in charge of the game, there were loud groans from the Australian and New Zealand media corps.
Lewis is a nice guy but over the years we had seen too many flighty performances from him. In such a crucial match, you don't want someone who often seems to be struggling to keep control
During the first half, it seemed as though the All Blacks could do nothing wrong and the Wallabies were cast in the role of serial offenders, especially at the breakdown. At one stage, the penalty count was 11-2 in the All Blacks' favour.
The penalties, many of which would have been free kicks under the ELV laws, kept going New Zealand's way and it kept them in the game.
The Wallabies pack were bewildered. Although they were holding firm, they were continually penalised for supposed errors in their engagement and easy points kept coming for the All Blacks.
It got worse in the second half, when Lewis appeared to lose his sense of direction and missed several forward passes, the most glaring being when Sitiveni Sivivatu put Richie McCaw in for the match-winning try. The pass was thrown several metres forward.
The Wallabies didn't help themselves early in the second half when a lapse in concentration led to Sivivatu levelling the scores. Nonetheless, the Wallabies have every right to be seething about Lewis because his performance had too much of a bearing on the outcome.
The Wallabies did have it all over the All Blacks. Then in walked Jerry, I mean, Alan Lewis, and the stand-up comedy routine began.
http://www.rugbyheaven.com.au/news/n...560645720.html
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Originally Posted by Burgs
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Courtesy of quality South African commentry
front row and made some extraordinary guesses.
