Chapeau, Luke Pearce

Experienced Premiership referee Luke Pearce has, quite rightly, received plenty of praise for the way he dealt with dissent in the Exeter vs Saracens game on Saturday.

It is quite rare these days to see referees march teams back 10 metres when players speak out of turn, but Pearce took no nonsense on Saturday, repeatedly marching players back for disputing decisions, at one point sending Saracens 20 metres after repeated comments from Billy Vunipola – turning an innocuous penalty in Exeter’s half into a penalty which Exeter were able to convert. Saracens went on to lose the game by 3 points.

We talk a lot about respect in rugby, and often get on our high horse when making comparisons with football, but in reality much has changed in the last 30 years or so and whingeing and moaning at referees by players has become more or less endemic at all levels of the game.

I completely get that players can become frustrated by referees’ decisions – and Pearce made several calls on Saturday which I thought were pretty dubious. But frustration with referees has always been there – it’s just that back in the day we knew how to keep our mouths shut. 

It is therefore about time that someone addressed the constant backchat that accompanies rugby these days and hopefully Pearce’s actions will set something of a precedent.

So, well done Luke Pearce. 

Total Flanker – the older I get, the better I was