Springboks vs Wales June 2014: Alun Wyn Jones & Steve Walsh discuss the Penalty Try incident

There is always something to discuss after a rugby Test match, especially one as thrilling as this.

There are the action and the special moments to discuss, the performance of players and all to frequently the Laws of the Game, the ever-changing, confusing and after controversial Laws of the Game and the demands of applying them accurately.

There were two tries especially discussed after the Nelspruit Test – one a try by the Welsh hooker and the other the definitive penalty try near the end – and penalty tries are rare and always debated.

Let’s start with the penalty try:

Wales lead 30-24 as the match draws to an end. The Springboks are on frantic attack. They go right and Willie le Roux shifts slightly to his right and throws a perfect pass to Cornal Hendricks on the right wing. Hendricks has an overlap but is not far from touch. He manages to get past George North and, less than a metre from the line, he bends to start his dive for the corner. But Wales’s fullback Liam Williams, intent on saving his side, comes across with a powerful dive and knocks Hendricks into touch.

Immediately the referee and his assistant discuss what looked like foul play in Williams’s tackle. The referee then consults the TMO.

It is clear that Williams made contact with his shoulder first against the neck/head of Hendricks, followed by his elbow.

The referee acknowledges this as foul play. Is it?

The answer is in Law 10 which deals with foul play.

Law 10.4 DANGEROUS PLAY AND MISCONDUCT
(g) Dangerous charging. A player must not charge or knock down an opponent carrying the ball without trying to grasp that player.
Sanction: Penalty kick

What Williams did was foul play.

Law 22.4 (h) Penalty try. A penalty try is awarded if a try would probably have been scored but for foul play by the defending team.

Williams’s foul play prevented Hendricks from scoring a try. The try was otherwise highly probable.

The referee was at pains to explain this to Alun Wyn Jones, the Welsh captain and then the referee went off to award the try between the goal posts.

Law 22.4 (i) A penalty try is awarded between the goal posts. The defending team-may charge the conversion kick after a penalty try.

The referee acted in accordance with the laws, though he probably should have sent Williams to the sin bin.

Law 10.2 (a) A penalty try must be awarded if the offence prevents a try that would probably otherwise have been scored. A player who prevents a try being scored through foul play must either be cautioned and temporarily suspended or sent off.

There is an argument that the try may probably not have been scored if Williams had tackled fairly. That is a specious argument. The only way Williams tackled was illegal. He did not do anything legal to prevent Hendricks from scoring. Sadly for him and Wales he could not untackle Hendricks and replace it with a legal act. That is why the referee explained to Wyn Jones that what Williams did was ‘taken out of the equation’.

The other try was that scored by hooker Ken Owens of Wales:

A penalty gave Wales, leading 17-14 at the time, an attacking line-out. Owens threw into the line-out. Wales won the ball and formed a maul which the Springboks contained. Wales broke away to the left and started bashing. Owens was one of this who bashed. Then beyond the goal posts he got a pass close to the line, put his head down and charged for the line. Tendai Mtawarira tackled him and he was plunging towards the line where Duane Vermeulen grabbed him. Owens fell just short of the line with the ball in front of him, under his left arm. The ball ended on the line with Owens’s fingertips on it.

The referee consulted his assistant and then the TMO. Eventually the try was awarded.

Does Owens have possession?
Doers he keep possession?

Look to the Law.

Law 22.1 GROUNDING THE BALL
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.

Is Owens holding the ball?

It’s hard to think he is doing so, unless fingertips constitute holding.

Law 22.4 OTHER WAYS TO SCORE A TRY
(d) Momentum try. If an attacking player with the ball is tackled short of the goal-line but the player’s momentum carries the player in a continuous movement along the ground into the opponents’ in-goal, and the player is first to ground the ball, a try is scored.
(e) Tackled near the goal-line. If a player is tackled near to the opponents’ goal-line so that this player can immediately reach out and ground the ball on or over the goal-line, a try is scored.

(d) Owens has no momentum. He is stopped short of the line.
(e) Owens does not reach out.

Owens is tackled – a ball-carrier held and brought to ground

Law 15.5 THE TACKLED PLAYER
(d) A tackled player may release the ball by pushing it along the ground in any direction except forward, provided this is done immediately.
Sanction: Penalty kick

Owen had no momentum and he did not stretch.
He either lost the ball forward, in which case it was a knock-on and a scrum, or rolled it forward, in which case it was a penalty.

It seems highly unlikely that a try should have been awarded.

Just as a matter of interest, one wonders what the role of the TMO in practice now is. Agreed that the final decision is the referee’s but surely a trained TMO has a bigger role to play than that of video producer!

Secondly, in both these instances a captain was always in close attendance on the referee. This is becoming more prevalent and not a good idea.

Here’s footage of the Cornal Hendricks incident, which ld to the penalty try:

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g71yBh4mVpQ[/youtube]