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'Maybe we have to move Australia to the northern hemisphere' - Cheika's furious response to Farrell shoulder charge decision

Michael Cheika was unable to hide his displeasure that Australia were denied a penalty try for an apparent shoulder charge by Owen Farrell in Saturday’s 37-18 defeat to England.

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England earned a record sixth straight win over the Wallabies thanks to tries from Jonny May, Elliot Daly, Joe Cokanasiga and Farrell.

But Australia were in the ascendancy as the first half came to an end and were harshly not awarded the penalty try when Farrell seemed to unfairly challenge powerful lock Izack Rodda just shy of the try line.

That denied Australia the chance to lead at the break and Cheika says the incident was more blatant than Farrell’s last-gasp shoulder charge on Andre Esterhuizen in England’s contentious opening November international win over South Africa.

“Look, you can’t definitively say that [the game changed at that moment] can you?” He told Sky Sports. 

“But we had three disallowed tries because I’m counting that as one, and not even one referral back? 

“Maybe we have to move Australia to the northern hemisphere, because after [Farrell’s] shoulder charge [against South Africa] we went to a meeting with the referees and the refs categorically told us it’s a penalty, so if that’s a penalty then that’s three penalties. 

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“To say he [Rodda] also dropped his shoulder is ludicrous.”

Opposite number Eddie Jones was asked for his view, with the England coach jokingly replying: “The TMO is the most popular man in World Rugby! We’ll leave it at that.”

Cheika, though, conceded his side were soundly beaten.

“We needed to attack more, we gave too much ball away by kicking,” he said. 

“Maybe to try and get some field position, but let’s just get on and play some footie.”

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Soliloquin 1 hour ago
Competing interests and rotated squads: What the 'player welfare summer' is really telling us

I don’t know the financial story behind the changes that were implemented, but I guess clubs started to lose money, Mourad Boudjellal won it all with Toulon, got tired and wanted to invest in football , the French national team was at its lowest with the QF humiliation in 2015 and the FFR needed to transform the model where no French talent could thrive. Interestingly enough, the JIFF rule came in during the 2009/2010 season, so before the Toulon dynasty, but it was only 40% of the players that to be from trained in French academies. But the crops came a few years later, when they passed it at the current level of 70%.

Again, I’m not a huge fan of under 18 players being scouted and signed. I’d rather have French clubs create sub-academies in French territories like Wallis and Futuna, New Caledonia and other places that are culturally closer to RU and geographically closer to rugby lands. Mauvaka, Moefana, Taofifenua bros, Tolofua bros, Falatea - they all came to mainland after starting their rugby adventure back home.

They’re French, they come from economically struggling areas, and rugby can help locally, instead of lumping foreign talents.

And even though many national teams benefit from their players training and playing in France, there are cases where they could avoid trying to get them in the French national team (Tatafu).

In other cases, I feel less shame when the country doesn’t believe in the player like in Meafou’s case.

And there are players that never consider switching to the French national team like Niniashvili, Merckler or even Capuozzo, who is French and doesn’t really speak Italian.

We’ll see with Jacques Willis 🥲


But hey, it’s nothing new to Australia and NZ with PI!

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