Loose Pass
This week we will be mostly concerning ourselves with the French revolution and the man in the mask…
Welcome to Loose Pass – our weekly assortment of disjointed thoughts. This week we will be mostly concerning ourselves with the French revolution and the man in the mask…
Le jeu est fait! That's Monte Carlo chat meaning 'no more bets', don't you know. And they mean it this time. They really do.
The top table of European rugby has been reduced to just two place-settings, and the French will occupy both seats.
It's pretty obvious where this mighty snub leaves the high-rolling luminaries of Britain, Ireland and Italy: on the slab, awaiting autopsy.
But let's try and skip past that bloody mess and see if we can pick out at least a couple of positives.
Right.
Here we go.
Erm.
Wait! How about this: the June tours.
Those old excuses about club-tied absentees can only be cashed in by Les Bleus ahead of their circumnavigation of the South Atlantic. Europe's other 'superpowers' can now fly south with full-strength squads.
Faulty firing systems have opened up the chance for a full weapons test on foreign fields ahead of Rugby World Cup 2011, and it's an opportunity they must grab with both hands.
Will they? Of course not. They'll come up with some sort of lame cop-out about the need for rest (after too much losing).
But we'll leave the challenge out there and see how the unions respond.
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The sound of scoffing emanated from the television commentary booths as the video referee in Toulouse took his time to rule out Maxime Medard's attempted touchdown against Leinster.
The French flyer's legs were clearly in touch as he attempted to dot down the ball, and there was incredulity as to why the TMO needed a number of replays to rule out the try.
But one of rugby's least known and most quirky laws dictates that you can have your whole body in touch-in-goal and still score a try.
Indeed, the referral had absolutely nothing to do with the Frenchman's errant lower limbs and all to do with whether he had grounded the ball correctly.
As it turns out, it was Medard's superior skills that let him down: the try might have stood had he not caught the ball before touching down.
Law 22.4
(g) Player in touch or touch-in-goal. If an attacking player is in touch or in touch-in-goal, the player can score a try by grounding the ball in the opponents' in-goal provided the player is not carrying the ball.
The commentators also endeavoured to give the officials a bad name in the fascinating Army versus Navy game at Twickenham earlier on the same day.
As Navy prop Gareth Evans crashed over in the dying seconds, we were informed that there was only two questions that the TMO needed to answer: did Evans “have control and was there any downward pressure.”
More scoffing accompanied replay after replay, and a little incredulity followed as the winning try was awarded on the strength of the faintest of brushes of the outside of Evans's fingers with the grounded ball.
Again, it was the correct call.
Law 22.1
There are two ways a player can ground the ball:
(a) Player touches the ground with the ball. A player grounds the ball by holding the ball and touching the ground with it, in in-goal. 'Holding' means holding in the hand or hands, or in the arm or arms. No downward pressure is required.
(b) Player presses down on the ball. A player grounds the ball when it is on the ground in the in-goal and the player presses down on it with a hand or hands, arm or arms, or the front of the player's body from waist to neck inclusive.
The touch-in-goal law might be beyond most, but even the best pundits trot out the untruths about “downward pressure” and “control” as prerequisites for tries – and each time they call the integrity of officials into false question.
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HERO OF THE WEEK
Easy. Please refer to the picture above if you require any further details.
A picture is worth a thousand words, of course, but we'll add a handful to make it clear: that's a broken schnoz lurking in there – but he played on.
Later, when it looked like Munster had added a couple of broken ribs, he played on.
Imanol Harinordoquy, ladies and gents – hard and very unordinary. You will not see this sort of behaviour on the soccer fields of South Africa in the coming months.
Complied by Andy Jackson