I refereed a very pleasant, open and competitive U18 game this morning. No aggro, everyone behaved and home team won 37-19 scoring 7tries to 3. After the game the home coach was quite happy except for two things.
1) said the a team could not take the second penalty quickly. Put him right on this but not sure he was toally convinced.
2) From a restart black go for the ball and the player is taken in the air. He wasn't far of the ground and the red player who took him early was more clumsy than anything else. Certainly not malicious. I gave a penalty and had a quick word with the offending player who was the red captain. The black coach reckoned that it was an automatic yellow card at this level. I disagree and even in professional games we see players tackle in the air without a card being shown. After I gave the penalty the players just got on with the game without a grumble. What do the rest of you think?
1) said the a team could not take the second penalty quickly. Put him right on this but not sure he was toally convinced.
2) From a restart black go for the ball and the player is taken in the air. He wasn't far of the ground and the red player who took him early was more clumsy than anything else. Certainly not malicious. I gave a penalty and had a quick word with the offending player who was the red captain. The black coach reckoned that it was an automatic yellow card at this level. I disagree and even in professional games we see players tackle in the air without a card being shown. After I gave the penalty the players just got on with the game without a grumble. What do the rest of you think?