Yes, every tight head bind was the same, and no, it was never penalised.
Armbands at Newlands?
Thanks to Barbarian for the idea and Moses for a good slug of the legwork.
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Tags: al baxter, video highlights, youtube
Video: JUSTICE 4 AL
– August 4, 2009Posted in: All Blacks, South Africa, Wallabies
Tags: al baxter, video highlights, youtube
About the Author
Matt a.k.a Gagger or GAGR (short for GreenAndGoldRugby, not a fetish)
Matt started G&GR just before the 2007 Rugby World Cup and has been enslaved ever since. You can follow him on Twitter here http://www.twitter.com/Matt_Gagger 
I’m seeing a pattern there, and half of those are right in front of the ref!
A fair proportion were bound on the arm you’d say. And did you notice how Franks ‘unbound’ and then ‘rebound’ a number of times due to the pressure? There was also hands on the deck – neither of these were penalised or policed.
with the sprinboks talking up al again and the whole aussie scrum you can rest assured it wont go unoticed this week!
maybe a scrum ref would be an idea worth looking into. its clear they make it up as they go along.
No! No! No! not another fool on the ground to get decisions wrong. One ref is fine. If anything, stop being so pedantic with the scrums.
Thanks to Gagger, Barbarian and Moses for a most compelling compilation of visual evidence.
It makes obvious what many of us have been arguing, namely, that Baxter is being victimised for his past sins. It took him many years to become a competent scrummager, but for the past couple of seasons he has been world-class.
Unfortunately the “angry-face” he puts on to try to look tough appears to be ineradicable. Surely one of his school-age coaches or even his dad should have pulled him aside many years ago and told him, “Give it away, son. You look like a goose.”
Technically, Craig Joubert had the Laws on his side in penalising Baxter for infringing 20.3(c) which decrees “The tight head prop must grip the loose head prop’s jersey with the right hand only on the back or side. The tight head prop must not grip the chest, arm, sleeve or collar of the opposition loose head prop.”
But there is also 20.5(a) which states “No Delay. As soon as the front rows have come together, the scrum half must throw in the ball without delay.” This is ignored in every scrum in every game I’ve ever watched.
More importantly, as the video shows, Nigel Owens was entitled to penalise the All Black or Springbok tight heads at every engagement shown for breaching 20.3(c).
There is also the issue of the “crouch-touch-pause-engage” sequence. 20.1(h) says:
The referee will call “crouch” then “touch”. The front rows crouch and using their outside arm each prop touches the point of the opposing prop’s outside shoulder. The props then withdraw their arms. The referee will then call “pause”. Following a pause the referee will then call “engage”. The front rows may then engage.
I don’t know whether it was due to Gagger’s video editing but in the game in South Africa referee Owens appeared to start his verbal instructions with “touch” thus bypassing the “crouch” instruction.
Much more significantly he constantly conflated “pause” and “engage” into a single word, “pausengage”.
His is a most extreme example of a refusal by all referees to observe the law which clearly requires that after they call “pause” there is to be a pause before they call “engage”.
The purpose of the pause is obviously to ensure that both packs are stationary and steady before they come together, much like the pause before the starter’s gun in sprinting or swimming.
I have tried on more than a few occasions to explain this simple matter to senior referees but they are a thick-headed lot. Notwithstanding, I will keep trying to assist them to grasp this elementary piece of logic.
Great stuff Bruce. Brings a tear to my eye seeing a man so fluent in his scrum laws.
On the point about the pause, I reckon the ref’s most important job is to ensure he’s consistent in his C-T-P-E rhythm. If both packs can read this, then their timing will be more in sync, less collapses and unstable scrums.
Whether the pause is one second or half a second, doesn’t really matter (although it’s tough coiling for an extended period)…as long as it’s consistent.
Case in point is the ref I’ve played under who had a stutter. C-c-cr-crouch…t-t-t-t-tou-touch…p-p-p-p-p-p-pau-paus-pause…en-gage!
That rule (20.3(c)) seems to be constructed to allow either side of any collapsed scrum to be penalised.
Only the back or side? how about shoulder?
Thanks for the insight.
The challenge for Baxter is that when he was penalised his elbow was pointed to the ground. A clear sign to a ref that the THP is exerting downward pressure on the LHP. Sure it starts straight, but then ……
The successful scrums had the THP, despite binding on the shoulder/elbow, keeping his elbow is up.
Correct. Elbow must not point towards ground, but this applies to the loose head also. It requires some effort on behalf of the tighthead to force the loosehead’s elbow down, before he can follow with his own elbow. In almost all of these examples, the loosehead has his elbow down, immediately on engagement. Ergo, following your arguement should be penalty against the loosehead. When the loosehead pulls down, the tighthead’s right shoulder drops with him, taking his right elbow down also.
Yep the ref could have penalised Woodcock and he may have, if the first couple of scrums weren’t dominated by the ABs.
To me Baxter was trying to negate the pressure and got caught/blamed by the ref, but didn’t modify his tactics in the following scrums
Good point on the first couple of scrums FP.
However, if you focus purely on the bind you miss the fact that both of their elbows are dropping at Eden Park because Woodcock is folding down and/or in, as he does in plenty of the scrums above.
Are you tight or loosehead……;)
Scrum chat – emotional!! More of it!
I’m a fullback – can someone please explain what is going on here?
It’s about pies and beer. Not hair gel. Nothing to worry about.
Phew. I thought I may have to do something else other than make you lot look good.
A Prop always looks good. He’s born with a rugged handsome big head, and he dies that way.
It seems to me that the whole issue of scrumaging is one that doesn’t transfer from its structures in theory to those in practice.
It seems to be an area where one side can get crucified based on perception which makes for a totally confusing contest when it appears the other team is committing the same errors.
It so destroys the game.
I think the whole issue brings up the bigger issue of consistency, or the clear lack there of..! Needs to be addressed
Agreed.
.-= Stu Andrews´s last blog ..Episode #11 – The “Get Dan Crowley In Your Ear” Episode =-.
maybe next time you can come up with a video of barnes stuffing that pass up to smith and thus not giving the wallibies a 17-3 lead.
that is where you lost the game.
Of course Barnes fucked the pass up, he’s a Waratah.
I can’t wait to see Fatcat up against Smit… who hasn’t quite mastered the art. I think it could be a point of weakness – probably why the boks are calling us cheats – trying to flat it to the ref’s early!!
Oh irony of them calling us cheats…
Smit has Bakkies working behind him, he will be fine unfortunately.
Actually I think the point about preception having way to much to do with the reffing in Rugby is valid. As a fan of a small, useless Rugby nation (Canada) I can tell you that we tend to get penalized more when we play against the big boys. Even when we played Ireland a few years ago the Irish announcer mentioned that Canada seemed to be getting away with much less at the breakdown than the Irish. Now, this is because A) we have less talented and sneaky players who just aren’t as good as getting away with stuff. Its a skill in rugby and Canada doesn’t have it. but B) the ref didn’t seem to believe Canada might occasionally steal a ball on the ground. Yes I am totally bias in this case (I just want Canada to beat someone) and No, we wouldn’t have won even if we had bribed the refs with all the Maple syrup in Canada, but its so frustrating to watch no matter which country you support. Australia and Canada and Ireland and Uruguay need the same rules. Just because ONCE Australia was a weak scrummaging team doesn’t mean they still are.
I agree, the expectations of opposing teams at scrum time tends to influence the ref’s decisions.
The other point is that teams that claim to be the dominant scrummagers are generally afraid in every other aspect and hope to win on field position and penalties.