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Nigel Owens weighs in on match-defining moment as South Africa beat England
By Josh Raisey
Former referee Nigel Owens has labelled the decision to penalise England at the scrum in the final minutes of their World Cup semi-final against South Africa as “very, very, debatable,” saying it goes down to the referee’s interpretation on the day.
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Referee Ben O’Keeffe penalised replacement loosehead Ellis Genge for driving across against South Africa late in the semi-final, whereby Handre Pollard stepped up and converted the resulting penalty kick to give the world champions a 16-15 victory.
On Whistle Watch this week, the Welshman discussed that decision and explained why O’Keeffe came to it, all while highlighting the infringement Genge’s opposite man Vincent Koch was perceived to have committed.
“Now, big talking point in that wonderful, exciting and intense game was the last penalty in the scrum,” Owens said.
“There are a lot of things to look at here. So do we have Ellis Genge going to his knee? Yes, we do. Now what tends to happen, if a player goes to his knee, the referee will deal with that there and then. The referee here decides that Ellis Genge gets back up on his feet, so he continues the scrum. What happens next is we have Ellis Genge going across, but also some of you have quite rightly highlighted that you have the tighthead of South Africa [Vincent Koch] also going across.
“So what the referee has to deal with here, he has to deal with what he believes is the first offence. So for him, the first offence is the knee on the ground. The South Africa tighthead going across then, for him, is the second offence. So it’s one of those very, very debatable ones. The only thing I would say, if you are going to penalise a knee on the ground, then you need to penalise it when it happens. Not afterwards when something else has happened. It’s a little bit like the contact area. There’s no point you coming in and penalising the second or the third offence, and not penalising the first one. It will then be too late to go back to it.
“So, in this instance here, the referee penalised Ellis Genge for going across, because he feels the action on the knee has contributed to that. It’s a very, very tough call and to be honest it’s one that comes down to your interpretation as a referee on the day.”
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The scrum came off the back of 20 minutes of dominance at the set piece from South Africa, as their vaunted ‘Bomb Squad’ helped book their place in the World Cup final against the All Blacks on Saturday.
English teams and their supporters are terrible losers. Get over it.
If you want a reason why the ref made his decision backtrack to the previous two scrums where your prop made the exact same infringement … so three and out. Really should also have received a yellow card … but let’s not confuse English team and supporters with the facts!
Headline should be: Nienaber confirms the world champions and no 1 ranked team back up No 9 ….haha 😂😂😂 they hate it that No 1 and. 2 is Southern Hemisphere teams. Enjoy the game watching it on Virgin Sport
The match deciding moment was when Owen Farrel continued to harass the referee.
It is very unfortunate that a New Zealand referee makes numerous contentious decisions in 2 consecutive matches that decide which team will meet the AB in the final.
Whatever you are inferring here, surely the All Blacks would rather have played England in the final than SA?? So that sorts that “ veiled “ theory out.😳
Err, you think someone would want their team to have to play the best in the world?
Or are you actually a Springbok support who is coitizing him for even letting England get close to the upset?
Wasn’t that last week?
His analysis is correct as usual but not really helpful as Noone outside England cares.
Moving on….
There’s no debate in that. You always go back to the first offence (as he later points out even).
I don’t know about Nigel and these weekly podcasts. It seems like he wants to contribute something back to the game and fans, I certainly don’t think hes in it for the money, but he just doesn’t seem to put much thought into these weekly shows. He certainly hasn’t articulated what his thought process/reactions were if he does.
If I was listening to him and trying to figure out what he was trying to say I’d ask him two question. From the second paragraph it would be “So even though Koch got away with angling in the whole game, you think he would have been prepared to penalize him here, instead of Genge, if he hadn’t seen a knee go to the ground”? That would give us his picture, or his idea of O’keefe’s, make him actually state what he’d do/saw. I’d imagine he’d have gone for a reset, so I’ve had made sure he actually watched the game and thought about this by asking “so even though the ref explicitly told them to (Genge) “keep you feet up and don’t ever extend” and (Kock) “stay straight”, after they had just collapsed the last scrum, and England had had to do a whole lot of pushing and shoving with sideways movement after they got back to their feet and before the ball was even put in, as a result of Genge doing the exact thing he was told not to in overextending, all with the clock ticking down, you would have gone for a 3rd reset (or penalty to England)?” You wouldn’t load you question like that but you’d ensure he saw each point before you accepted his view.
I don’t know (enough about scrummaging) if a lack of dominance from Ox squeezing in this time could have been the reason why this scrum went sideways, and none of the others did? It also doesn’t appear he looked too hard at the tape as it was actually the hooker who went to the knee (well perhaps they both did). I would say it’s debatable that O’keefe shoudl have gone to a 3rd reset scrum after such clear warnings and later transgressions, and with that as the case, and as Nigel said about the first offence, I would have gone back to the knee, and the consequences it caused, as enough reason to award the penalty (especially if it was both 1 and 2 that went to ground).
Interesting, and a good talking point in and of itself Nigel.
As you said, go back to the first offence. And the ref indicated that it is for going to the knee, when awarding the penalty .
“The only thing I would say, if you are going to penalise a knee on the ground, then you need to penalise it when it happens. Not afterwards when something else has happened.”
Isn’t this what a we call advantage? To try and let the game flow.
Not helpful Nigel. Either be a ref or not. You weren't there. Your hindsight and access to slow mo's, your opinions given days after the fact, only feed the disappointed who now have fodder to throw at a current ref. You should know better.
Oh please, decision made, game over, get a life folks. It's in the history books.
As said by W Gatland, the first debatable décision was to name Ben O'Keefe for a game for deciding the NZ opponent in a World cup final.
Oh please…how deep does the conspiracy run?
Id prefer the best ref before even suggested that that sort of crap is worth consideration.
I’m surprised it came from Gats, well actually, after the few seasons he spent back home, I’m not.
Rumor has it that the ABs were going to get tipped out of RWC in the quarter finals. As usual Gats talking out his arse.
Oh really. The refs are named before the games are played and it’s decided as to who actually makes the final 🙄 Sheesh.
And no, the AB’s had no preference as to who they play. They were pleased to have very good reasons to beat either of the potential options. Number 1 being they haven’t beaten either of them the last time they played.
Pretty sure the All Blacks would rather be facing England.
Why does he not weigh in on three other dubious penalties for England which was NOT debatable. Those were very very very wrong decisions 😕 from OKeefe. We did not complain about that penalty of PSD at ruck, DW surely won a penalty when an English player held onto the ball and a few more other very very very debatable decisions. Anyway does this change the teams in the final…NO.