Leinster Vs Bath - Saturday

[FKAS]

Leinster Rugby (caps in brackets):
15. Hugo Keenan (70)
14. Garry Ringrose (132)
13. Robbie Henshaw (97)
12. Jordie Barrett (4)
11. Jamie Osborne (55)
10. Sam Prendergast (24)
9. Jamison Gibson-Park (150) 1. Andrew Porter (130)
2. Rónan Kelleher (70)
3. Rabah Slimani (10)
4. Joe McCarthy (41)
5. James Ryan (91)
6. Max Deegan (122)
7. Josh van der Flier (151)
8. Jack Conan (157) CAPTAIN Replacements
16. Gus McCarthy (10)
17. Cian Healy (286)
18. Thomas Clarkson (49)
19. RG Snyman (9)
20. Caelan Doris (90)
21. Luke McGrath (221)
22. Ross Byrne (174)
23. Jimmy O’Brien (90)

Referee: Luc Ramos (FFR)

Bath Rugby Starting XV: 1 Beno Obano, 2 Niall Annett, 3 Will Stuart, 4 Quinn Roux, 5 Ross Molony, 6 Ted Hill, 7 Miles Reid, 8 Alfie Barbeary, 9 Ben Spencer ©, 10 Finn Russell, 11 Ruaridh McConnochie, 12 Max Ojomoh, 13 Ollie Lawrence, 14 Joe Cokanasiga, 15 Tom de Glanville

Replacements: 16 Tom Dunn, 17 Francois van Wyk, 18 Thomas du Toit, 19 Charlie Ewels, 20 Josh Bayliss, 21 Louis Schreuder, 22 Orlando Bailey, 23 Jaco Coetzee

[Mellsblue]

Good to see that Lawrence recovered so quickly…

[fivepointer]

Pity i dont have Premier sports as this is one game i'm very interested in watching.

Big test for Bath and the kind of game that will tell us just how much they've moved on this year.

[TheNomad]

Think it’ll be quite one sided personally. The Bath pack is good, but I doubt strong enough

Hope in weong

[FKAS]

What a start from Bath. They seem to have identified something on the video analysis about Leinster's wide defence. Some early joy and a try after 2 mins.

[Mellsblue]

What a start from Bath. They seem to have identified something on the video analysis about Leinster's wide defence. Some early joy and a try after 2 mins.

Did you end up buying a Premier Sports pass then?

[FKAS]

Shocking call to give Obano his second yellow. He's penalised for Slimani driving straight in at the hooker. Referee doesn't seem to want to ref the scrum and has made his mind up Leinster are on top so anything that isn't clean is just a Leinster penalty.

[Epaminondas Pules]

The refereeing in this game is quite simply a joke! It is ludicrously one sided! And I say that as someone that really enjoys seeing Bath get banged!

[FKAS]

The refereeing in this game is quite simply a joke! It is ludicrously one sided! And I say that as someone that really enjoys seeing Bath get banged!

Agree with all of that. I've turned it off. No point watching the finale.

[BaldiePete]

The refereeing in this game is quite simply a joke! It is ludicrously one sided! And I say that as someone that really enjoys seeing Bath get banged!

Mack Hansen agrees

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union ... 8g0g89y32o

[paddy no 11]

Shocking stuff

He let prendergast tap a penalty after telling the bath captain to talk to his players and obano on the deck getting treated. No matter He apoloised after, if leinster had scored he'd have awarded the try

[p/d]

What a start from Bath. They seem to have identified something on the video analysis about Leinster's wide defence. Some early joy and a try after 2 mins.

Did you end up buying a Premier Sports pass then?

I’m going out on a limb here, but thinking yes.

[Puja]

The refereeing in this game is quite simply a joke! It is ludicrously one sided! And I say that as someone that really enjoys seeing Bath get banged!

Mack Hansen agrees

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union ... 8g0g89y32o

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union ... q1qdq1qwjo
http://www.rugbyrebels.co.uk/viewtopic.php?t=7122

I would say that I thought Obano's first yellow was harsh though. I would've said he's bent at the hips, trying to make a legal tackle - what's the foul play?

Puja

[Mellsblue]

What a start from Bath. They seem to have identified something on the video analysis about Leinster's wide defence. Some early joy and a try after 2 mins.

Did you end up buying a Premier Sports pass then?

I’m going out on a limb here, but thinking yes.

I think he was one of the posters who said he wouldn’t so was interested in what changed his mind.

[paddy no 11]

Ben Spencer with 2 massive blunders today, how da fuck can a scrum half not tap a pen. Obano got red 5 minutes later, could have completely changed the narrative of the game if they scored from 5 yards out

[Epaminondas Pules]

The refereeing in this game is quite simply a joke! It is ludicrously one sided! And I say that as someone that really enjoys seeing Bath get banged!

Mack Hansen agrees

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union ... 8g0g89y32o

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union ... q1qdq1qwjo
http://www.rugbyrebels.co.uk/viewtopic.php?t=7122

I would say that I thought Obano's first yellow was harsh though. I would've said he's bent at the hips, trying to make a legal tackle - what's the foul play?

Puja

I’m not sure how he gets lower than he already is.

[FKAS]

Mack Hansen agrees

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union ... 8g0g89y32o

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union ... q1qdq1qwjo
http://www.rugbyrebels.co.uk/viewtopic.php?t=7122

I would say that I thought Obano's first yellow was harsh though. I would've said he's bent at the hips, trying to make a legal tackle - what's the foul play?

Puja

I’m not sure how he gets lower than he already is.

The scrum half is always very low to the ground so it's tough for a bigger guy. He does try to make a legal tackle but scrum half steps back and then it's a clash of heads. Another ref might have had that at just penalty but Bath were hitting players off the ball and being very physical in defence, pushing the limits of the laws somewhat, so ref maybe not feeling sympathetic.

I have a lot of sympathy for these ones where the player is trying to make a legal tackle. It's not really the behaviour that the law is trying to change.

[Puja]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union ... q1qdq1qwjo
http://www.rugbyrebels.co.uk/viewtopic.php?t=7122

I would say that I thought Obano's first yellow was harsh though. I would've said he's bent at the hips, trying to make a legal tackle - what's the foul play?

Puja

I’m not sure how he gets lower than he already is.

The scrum half is always very low to the ground so it's tough for a bigger guy. He does try to make a legal tackle but scrum half steps back and then it's a clash of heads. Another ref might have had that at just penalty but Bath were hitting players off the ball and being very physical in defence, pushing the limits of the laws somewhat, so ref maybe not feeling sympathetic.

I have a lot of sympathy for these ones where the player is trying to make a legal tackle. It's not really the behaviour that the law is trying to change.

But it's not even a penalty.



It drops out on box 2 of the flowchart - Obano is not upright, he is bent at the hips, he is seeking to make a legal tackle and is not off his feet, nor upright, nor anything else that would make it an illegal action. The fact that there is head contact is completely irrelevant - because no foul play has occurred, it's a rugby incident and no further sanction occurs (except both of them going off for an HIA).

It is poor training and communication from World Rugby and their refereeing unions that the refereeing team saw head contact and immediately leaped straight to the degree of punishment, because they've had it inculcated that head contact requires somebody being seen to pay. Question 2 might not often come up because most head contacts are because someone was upright, but it's hugely important to follow.

Puja

[FKAS]

I’m not sure how he gets lower than he already is.

The scrum half is always very low to the ground so it's tough for a bigger guy. He does try to make a legal tackle but scrum half steps back and then it's a clash of heads. Another ref might have had that at just penalty but Bath were hitting players off the ball and being very physical in defence, pushing the limits of the laws somewhat, so ref maybe not feeling sympathetic.

I have a lot of sympathy for these ones where the player is trying to make a legal tackle. It's not really the behaviour that the law is trying to change.

But it's not even a penalty.



It drops out on box 2 of the flowchart - Obano is not upright, he is bent at the hips, he is seeking to make a legal tackle and is not off his feet, nor upright, nor anything else that would make it an illegal action. The fact that there is head contact is completely irrelevant - because no foul play has occurred, it's a rugby incident and no further sanction occurs (except both of them going off for an HIA).

It is poor training and communication from World Rugby and their refereeing unions that the refereeing team saw head contact and immediately leaped straight to the degree of punishment, because they've had it inculcated that head contact requires somebody being seen to pay. Question 2 might not often come up because most head contacts are because someone was upright, but it's hugely important to follow.

Puja

Depends on your point of view. The scrum half doesn't change height therefore it's up to Obano to drop the height of the tackle. Obano doesn't so he's at fault.

I'd have gone moderate degree of danger and then mitigated it down to penalty only personally.

[Puja]

The scrum half is always very low to the ground so it's tough for a bigger guy. He does try to make a legal tackle but scrum half steps back and then it's a clash of heads. Another ref might have had that at just penalty but Bath were hitting players off the ball and being very physical in defence, pushing the limits of the laws somewhat, so ref maybe not feeling sympathetic.

I have a lot of sympathy for these ones where the player is trying to make a legal tackle. It's not really the behaviour that the law is trying to change.

But it's not even a penalty.



It drops out on box 2 of the flowchart - Obano is not upright, he is bent at the hips, he is seeking to make a legal tackle and is not off his feet, nor upright, nor anything else that would make it an illegal action. The fact that there is head contact is completely irrelevant - because no foul play has occurred, it's a rugby incident and no further sanction occurs (except both of them going off for an HIA).

It is poor training and communication from World Rugby and their refereeing unions that the refereeing team saw head contact and immediately leaped straight to the degree of punishment, because they've had it inculcated that head contact requires somebody being seen to pay. Question 2 might not often come up because most head contacts are because someone was upright, but it's hugely important to follow.

Puja

Depends on your point of view. The scrum half doesn't change height therefore it's up to Obano to drop the height of the tackle. Obano doesn't so he's at fault.

It's not though - that's not the way the law works. Obano is bent at the waist and his head is only about 3.5ft above the ground - there's nothing further he can be doing in that situation to make a legal tackle. The fact that Gibson-Park's scuttle and step is so acute that his knee touches the ground is what causes the head contact, not any foul play from Obano.

The only way it would be Obano's responsibility to change height would be if we were claiming that he was aware enough to be actively aiming for the head region on a player going that low, which would be an exceedingly harsh call.

On a related note, rugby does need to stop and have a complete rethink and reset about what its cards are for in the general game. The problem of Bath receiving a red because of a scrum offence has come about because there has never been any plan, but just ad-hoc solutions nicked from other sports and bolted on. We stole the yellow and red from football for egregious acts of foul play, which was fine back in the days when we only really cared about people punching, and even then only when it was really obvious. Made sense to keep 2 Yellows = Red as well, as otherwise there was no punishment in getting a yellow and there's had to be some way of encouraging players that they needed to stop punching even after the ref had told them off.

However, when we wanted to nick the sin-bin concept from league, because we wanted to have bigger punishments for technical and cynical offences that slowed the game, we briefly had a triangular white card, but then decided that the paying public might get scared by the complexity of a third card and combined the sin-bin and the yellow, without thinking about the consequences of adding in a bunch of extra actions to the category of "2 of these and you leave the game permanently" club.

Now we're busy having a 20 minute red card and a really-red card for serious foul play (I don't know how those will be differentiated?) while not actually looking at why we have cards, whether 2 is the right number, and what their purpose is supposed to be. Needs a full rethink.

Puja

[FKAS]

But it's not even a penalty.



It drops out on box 2 of the flowchart - Obano is not upright, he is bent at the hips, he is seeking to make a legal tackle and is not off his feet, nor upright, nor anything else that would make it an illegal action. The fact that there is head contact is completely irrelevant - because no foul play has occurred, it's a rugby incident and no further sanction occurs (except both of them going off for an HIA).

It is poor training and communication from World Rugby and their refereeing unions that the refereeing team saw head contact and immediately leaped straight to the degree of punishment, because they've had it inculcated that head contact requires somebody being seen to pay. Question 2 might not often come up because most head contacts are because someone was upright, but it's hugely important to follow.

Puja

Depends on your point of view. The scrum half doesn't change height therefore it's up to Obano to drop the height of the tackle. Obano doesn't so he's at fault.

It's not though - that's not the way the law works. Obano is bent at the waist and his head is only about 3.5ft above the ground - there's nothing further he can be doing in that situation to make a legal tackle. The fact that Gibson-Park's scuttle and step is so acute that his knee touches the ground is what causes the head contact, not any foul play from Obano.

The only way it would be Obano's responsibility to change height would be if we were claiming that he was aware enough to be actively aiming for the head region on a player going that low, which would be an exceedingly harsh call.

On a related note, rugby does need to stop and have a complete rethink and reset about what its cards are for in the general game. The problem of Bath receiving a red because of a scrum offence has come about because there has never been any plan, but just ad-hoc solutions nicked from other sports and bolted on. We stole the yellow and red from football for egregious acts of foul play, which was fine back in the days when we only really cared about people punching, and even then only when it was really obvious. Made sense to keep 2 Yellows = Red as well, as otherwise there was no punishment in getting a yellow and there's had to be some way of encouraging players that they needed to stop punching even after the ref had told them off.

However, when we wanted to nick the sin-bin concept from league, because we wanted to have bigger punishments for technical and cynical offences that slowed the game, we briefly had a triangular white card, but then decided that the paying public might get scared by the complexity of a third card and combined the sin-bin and the yellow, without thinking about the consequences of adding in a bunch of extra actions to the category of "2 of these and you leave the game permanently" club.

Now we're busy having a 20 minute red card and a really-red card for serious foul play (I don't know how those will be differentiated?) while not actually looking at why we have cards, whether 2 is the right number, and what their purpose is supposed to be. Needs a full rethink.

Puja

Whilst I agree fully about the two yellows but the law isn't written so that you can make head contact as long as you are low. If the other player is always as low the emphasis on you is to be lower. JGP doesn't dip at any point, he's low and stays low. He does change direction which I think catches out Obano

For No fault the law says.

No fault
• Sudden and significant drop in height by the ball carrier
• Player had no time to readjust
• Involuntary collision
• No leading arm when close to the body

None of those apply to Obano. He always has a clear line of sight makes a good attempt at the tackle but gets it fractionally wrong.

He was definitely due mitigation.

Mitigation
• Sudden/significant drop in
height or change in direction
from ball carrier
• A late change in dynamics due to
another player in the contact
area
• An effort to wrap/bind and having
• No time to adjust
• Passive tackler

I still think low danger as well.

Low danger
• Indirect contact
• Low force
• Low speed
• No leading head / shoulder / forearm / swinging arm

So I'm still with penalty only.

[Puja]

Depends on your point of view. The scrum half doesn't change height therefore it's up to Obano to drop the height of the tackle. Obano doesn't so he's at fault.

It's not though - that's not the way the law works. Obano is bent at the waist and his head is only about 3.5ft above the ground - there's nothing further he can be doing in that situation to make a legal tackle. The fact that Gibson-Park's scuttle and step is so acute that his knee touches the ground is what causes the head contact, not any foul play from Obano.

The only way it would be Obano's responsibility to change height would be if we were claiming that he was aware enough to be actively aiming for the head region on a player going that low, which would be an exceedingly harsh call.

[...] the law isn't written so that you can make head contact as long as you are low. If the other player is always as low the emphasis on you is to be lower. JGP doesn't dip at any point, he's low and stays low. He does change direction which I think catches out Obano

For No fault the law says.

No fault
• Sudden and significant drop in height by the ball carrier
• Player had no time to readjust
• Involuntary collision
• No leading arm when close to the body

None of those apply to Obano. He always has a clear line of sight makes a good attempt at the tackle but gets it fractionally wrong.

The issue here, and I believe our disconnect, is that Obano is not the one who instigates the contact. If he is making a tackle on a straight-running player running that low with no change in height and he still clobbers him in the face, then yes, I agree it's foul play because he would have had to have been aiming at the head.

However, what has happened here is that JGP looks to be breaking to Obano's outside and Obano is in a good position to make a legal tackle on that basis, only for Gibson-Park to step dramatically back in the opposite direction. In several alternate universes, that step sees Obano flying sideways with his momentum and the 9 sauntering past with a smug look on his mug, but they're too close and so Gibson-Park basically steps back into the side of Obano's face.

It is not an aimed collision; it is involuntary and Obano has no time to readjust or avoid the contact and he's not doing anything illegal. It's just a rugby incident.

ETA. Went and checked the protocol (for any other nerds interested) again to see where that list of No Fault you referenced came in and it is giving those as " a non-exhaustive list of things to consider". The important bit for me is the exploration of what makes up Question 2 on the HCP of "Was there foul play?": "Considerations: • Intentional • Reckless • Avoidable – e.g. the defender is always upright". Which one of those was Obano doing to your mind?

Puja

[FKAS]

Avoidable. JGP doesn't drop his height, Obano needs to go lower. I'd mitigate it all the way down because his intention is to make a legal tackle and he does make an effort. Just needs to go further. Yellow is harsh we both agree, I'm at penalty and you're at play on.

[Puja]

Avoidable. JGP doesn't drop his height, Obano needs to go lower. I'd mitigate it all the way down because his intention is to make a legal tackle and he does make an effort. Just needs to go further. Yellow is harsh we both agree, I'm at penalty and you're at play on.

Huh, wild. I'm of the opinion that JGP steps back into him which causes the contact and it'd be incredible if he was able to avoid it, but each to their own. Happy to agree on the essential conclusion of no yellow.

Puja

[Epaminondas Pules]

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/rugby-union ... q1qdq1qwjo
http://www.rugbyrebels.co.uk/viewtopic.php?t=7122

I would say that I thought Obano's first yellow was harsh though. I would've said he's bent at the hips, trying to make a legal tackle - what's the foul play?

Puja

I’m not sure how he gets lower than he already is.

The scrum half is always very low to the ground so it's tough for a bigger guy. He does try to make a legal tackle but scrum half steps back and then it's a clash of heads. Another ref might have had that at just penalty but Bath were hitting players off the ball and being very physical in defence, pushing the limits of the laws somewhat, so ref maybe not feeling sympathetic.

I have a lot of sympathy for these ones where the player is trying to make a legal tackle. It's not really the behaviour that the law is trying to change.

It''s just a rugby incident for me. Obano is in a perfectly legal position; bent at the hip and aiming low; JGP steps late and they come together. It is one of those that just happens in a game, but there is nothing either player can do about it.