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Waratahs mystified at penalty reversal: 'It's unfathomable how those conclusions are reached'
By AAP
As the most penalised team in Super Rugby AU, NSW Waratahs accept their costly ill-discipline needs to improve.
But coach Rob Penney and skipper Rob Simmons were mystified by the swag of penalties that dented their quest to upset the Brumbies at ANZ Stadium on Saturday night.
Early in the match, the Brumbies conceded six successive penalties as the Waratahs dominated the set piece and breakdown to lead 15-0.
But by the end of the game, the hosts were on the wrong end of a 13-10 count as they suffered a heart-breaking 24-23 loss.
With scrum and ruck interpretations a long-time frustration of the game, Penney stopped short of criticising referee Angus Gardner's performance.
But he said it was annoying for players who didn't always feel they got the pay they were due, particularly around the breakdown and scrum.
"It's such a difficult game to referee," Penney said.
"You have a really dominant scrum and you get rewarded once and then you don't get rewarded again really, in fact you give away a few.
"It's unfathomable how those conclusions are reached.
"It's a shame it's difficult for the game to make those calls on."
Penney admitted that his team needed to do more in terms of getting back on-side or rolling away from the defensive breakdown.
A bitterly disappointed Simmons questioned the penalty square-up.
"How often do games end up 90/10, it always ends up 50/50, the ref's going to bring it back," Simmons said.
"Why? I don't know why that is but if you show dominance why doesn't it keep coming? I don't know."
The Waratahs next face Melbourne, who are coming off the bye, at the SCG on Friday night.
- Melissa Woods
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I think England obviously need to train alot more to fix their defense. Time together working to ensure each defender takes the right man is paramount or we're going to see the same amount of tries and losses. Then what? Sack the coach? What a joke that would be. The other fix is being accurate with your basics. England were sloppy to excess, dropped balls in the midfield. Charged down boxkicks, failed restarts. They need to carry out their basic skills accurately. This is a domestic club training responsibility. England should not be teaching their players catching skills. If the clubs are not spending time with skills training then the players need to step up and do it on their own time. There is no excuse for sloppy play at Test match level. They won't win squat if they don't aspire to be the best. Lastly we have the scrum which should be a strength of England but its flakey as. Okay its year one of the world cup cycle and you'd rather have these issues now that 2026 / 27 but we have alot to fix and we also have a media who won't give Borthwick the time he needs to fix them. That paragon of rugby Ugo Monye is already screaming for Borthwick's head. 14 caps and two tries and apparently he's the rugby media mesiah... ...This is where you say he's not the mesiah, he's a very naughty boy.
Go to commentsBen Smith your a biased against the Springboks -making it so obvious as a journalist makes you totally inadequate and not worthy of being taken seriously.
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