Stephen Jones: Lawrence was shite

[disco]

Yeah 1st half hour was a joke 8-0 penalty count and from that 8 I think 3 went against us when on attack in the opposition 30 metre zone.

No wonder we couldn't apply any real pressure & it doesn't help with 2 minutes of the 1st half to play Giteau decides to move into flyhalf off a perfect scrum platform & run at Jonny Wilkinson's left shoulder.

 

[Thomond78]

I know your love relationship for Lawrense after the BIL tour.

Oom Paarl look past the person and look to the way he reffed on the day. Sometimes wrong , sometimes right. Just my personal opinion on the day and I like refs that actually leave the rucks going into some hard core (learn this brand new word from NTA) fighting for the pill.

Oom, he's just a bad ref, pure and simple. Every time he refs, he's bad and he drags the game down with him. Simply, he's been given some cracking games, and perfect chances over and over, and he's blown it every time.

I'd like to see him dropped from the panel. Name to watch for; Jerome Garces, rising Frog ref. He's good; sensible, strict, but knows to let a bit of tickling go. Like Chris White, a ref I'd be happy to have again.

 

[Gagger]

I thought Bryce Lawrence was poor in the first 30 minutes.
His calls at the breakdown seemed focused against the guys in gold.

To his credit though, I thought he did start recognizing that their was another team on the paddock too after the halfhour mark and from there he was ok.

Agreed.

I think you may have forgotten a few like in the last 10 min when the new Pommy lock Laws walked around the side of a maul and pulled our ball out, which Bryce deemed "coming through the middle"

PS - See new poll at top

 

[Epi]

I thought Bryce Lawrence was poor in the first 30 minutes.
His calls at the breakdown seemed focused against the guys in gold.

To his credit though, I thought he did start recognizing that their was another team on the paddock too after the halfhour mark and from there he was ok.

Agreed.

I think you may have forgotten a few like in the last 10 min when the new Pommy lock Laws walked around the side of a maul and pulled our ball out, which Bryce deemed "coming through the middle"

PS - See new poll at top

Can you email the vid to Paddy O'Brien with a receipt request.

This is assuming he has email and doesn't communicate using carrier pigeons. This wouldn't surprise me as he obviously doesn't have a TV to watch the games...

 

[Lee Grant]

He's not even a good Touch Judge - sorry, Assistant Referee.

When Burger gouged the BI Lion's guy's eyes in the 1st minute of that Lions's game and the French ref asked for his recommendation, Lawrence said, "At least a yellow card." Yellow was the only word that the ref wanted to hear - no ref would want to do something that might have decided the game early, if he didn't see the incident himself.

Lawrence should have known that and said "Red card". His explanation later was at variance with what he told the the ref and was offered to reconcile, in some weak way, the act he saw with the recommendation he made.

Dickinson would have said "Red card" - no worries about that - and so would have Paddy O'Brien in his day. Say what you like about these two blokes but they have balls. If either were the referee and heard Lawrence's report I am confident that they would have asked, "Is there any reason why I should not give a red card?"

It's a pity about B. Lawrence: he refereed some good games in 2008 IIRR. Mind you, some of our coming in from the side in the 1st half at HQ on Saturday was bloody obvious and should not be questioned.

Thank God we won the game - otherwise we would have carried on like we did against Lewis in the Hong Kong game last year.

 

[Hugonaut]

Yep, put a video together – no one listens when you lose a game, but if you win one you're in a position to bleat about the ref. He was horrendous, absolutely horrendous – let English players flop over the ruck and seal off the ball several times in the first half when they were in possession [amongst many other poor decsions]. I know it's something that refs have been told to look out over the last couple of seasons, so I was shocked that he let so many blatant occurrences go.

 

[Gagger]

Your wish is my command

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oS7MQRS_yAI

 

[Scarfman]

Good video. Basically, the bloke should not be refereeing at this level. He doesn't hate Aussies like Kaplan, but I think he just got on a little glitch in the matrix in the first half. Decided that the Wallabies were coming in at the side and so watched for that - and nothing else - for about 30 mins. Apart from that, just generally hopeless.

 

[Lee Grant]

Good stuff Gagger. I remembered a lot of those incidents from the game and said to myself - or rather to one of the dogs: "WTF?"

Yeah that through the middle of the maul thing was bizarre watching it live - but in a way he was right - it was through the middle of the maul - sideways.

Yep there were some PKs against Oz that were plain wrong but some were right. I remember the first one on the clip as being right unfortunately and some others that I can't recall at the minute.

As for the Poms not being penalised enough for stuff which we were penalised for: correct, but we can not argue ipso facto that we did not transgress too much in the 1st half.

But this is what you get from a poor ref. He is weak and inconsistent and a plaything of the crowd. As I mentioned above: his behaviour as a TJ in the Lions series when Schalk did his eye gouging was weak, and as T78 mentioned: his wrongful caning of Vickery the week before, admitted later by him to Vickery (who said unfortunately, it was too late), was weak also. I give him no points for the admission - I want strength of character on the park.