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Tana Umaga sees red and blasts referees

Former All Blacks captain uses a farewell speech to launch a scathing attack on Southern Hemisphere officials.

by Hamish McBrearty on 07 May 2007

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Tana Umaga: Weatering the storm (gettyimages.com)

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Tana Umaga has denounced the lack of accountability for referees, saying that they have "the safest job in the world" and claimed that the Northern Hemisphere referees are far superior, Jonathan Kaplan excepted.

In some respects I agree with Umaga, however this is just an outburst of a player who has developed a bad attitude towards officials in the waning years of his career. Referees are held accountable for their actions on the field, they are assessed during every game and review their performances repeatedly.

However, for some reason referees seem to be off limits when it comes to criticism from coaches, players and even the media. All referees at Super 14 level are full-time professionals and really should not be considered "off limits" for critics. Yet when Reds' coach Eddie Jones criticised referee Matt Goddard for a dreadful performance, he was given a AU$10,000 fine for his remarks.

It is true that there are some issues with officials, it is important to remember that these latest comments come from the same Umaga who looked disbelievingly at referee Chris Pollock when he was given a yellow card for a professional foul two weeks ago. Some media commentators have suggested that perhaps a warning should have been given before issuing a card, but that would effectively given each team one free professional foul a game.

The other Umaga incident that springs to my mind was a Ranfurly Shield challenge a couple of seasons ago at Jade Stadium. Umaga was correctly penalised for not releasing a player he had tackled before attempting to play the ball, and yet after being marched a further 10 metres down the field still wanted to argue the point with the referee.

Some of the frustration players field these days is not with the referees, but with the laws of the game. There is still a great deal of confusion among all involved in the game as to when a tackle becomes a ruck, who is the tackler and what he may or may not do, and how soon "immediately" is.

While as referees, we are sometimes harder on defending teams, or rule on what we think we have seen, rather than what we have seen, at the end of the day all referees are only human and I challenge anyone, Tana Umaga included, to show me a game where a player makes no mistakes, is in position at all times and never anticipates incorrectly.

Being a referee is a pretty thankless job, when you do it right nobody notices, when you get it wrong there is nowhere to hide. For a player like Umaga to take a shot at referees just before leaving the country for a big money contract smacks of cowardice and shows a lack of class not usually seen from him.

Are rugby players and coaches too critical of referees? Post a comment below or submit an article with your views.

Comments (1)

by Tom Harness on May 07, 2007

Players and coaches criticism of the officials should be taken on the chin by refs, because as you say they are paid professionals and like in any job if they are not doing the work that they are being paid to do then they should be reprimanded for it and as it is the players and teams that suffer from bad ref decision, then surly its crazy if they are muzzeled and cannot say what everyone else thinks and says.