Had a clear example on Saturday of the confusion that the USA interpretation causes (or rather, the inconsistency I interpretation as I don't wish to cast aspersions on the interpretation itself, only the decision to be inconsistent with the rest of the world). I was refereeing Bahamas v USA South in the Caribbean championship. Approximately a month ago, prior to the Jamaica v USA South game, this issue was raised in the pre match meeting with USA South management, the IRB interpretation clarified and accepted and we moved forward to the match with no problems. USA South had a number of lineouts which involved bringing the receiver into the line, but they were very disciplined about ensuring a player swapped out into the receiver position, a full 2 metres away, before the ball was thrown. Fast forward a month to Saturday's game and the issue was not raised by USA South in the pre match meeting. I chose not to raise it as I had thought the position was clear. First USA lineout of the game, receiver comes in before ball is thrown, is lifted and catches. No clear swap out, so I free kick with following call, "receiver joining late, no swap". Next time ball is dead, USA South captain comes to me, "Sir, I thought we didn't have to have a receiver so the receiver can join late?". Bear in mind, he had been at the pre Jamaica management. So now I'm reduced to having to give the potted explanation in the middle of a televised international where I'm wired for sound so don't really want to say, "as we discussed a month ago, the USA interprets this differently from the rest of the world.". Situation was managed, and they made a clear effort to swap out a player for the rest of the game, but USA Rugby really needs to think about whether this inconsistency in their GMG is beneficial to their representative teams. As I say, I'm not going to argue the merits or demerits of the interpretation itself (old ground), but I cannot believe USA are really helping their players by holding their ground on this one.