Ireland Team Talk XII: Farrell's First Fifteen

i'm just listening to all the podcasts today. The Doris captaincy thing confuses me. Is he the captain at Leinster? I know they have co captains and such but not sure if they settled on him by end of season.

If he is Captain at Leinster, why not give him year to nail all these nuances that are supposedly putting him on the wrong side of refs, and just let him figure it out in a less pressure filled environment.

Beirne could do it for a year and refs seem to like him. Get Doris settled in next summer.

He doesn’t need to be captain at Leinster to be Irish captain, and where are the multiple examples of him getting on the wrong side of refs?

He and Pearce were both audibly frustrated with one another on Saturday, but Doris absolutely had good reason to be. This point has been reinforced by Andy Farrell’s comments post game and numerous reports in the media (including from neutral media outlets like the Guardian etc) commenting on the problematic aspects of Pearce and his team’s performance.

The tone Pearce took with Doris was totally unacceptable.

Doris is an experienced player who is really well respected, a nailed on starter and could be a long term appointment for Ireland. He’s an obvious contender for captain.

He's the stand in captain. Ryan and Ringrose are the captains. If Ryan had been able to start, I'd assume he'd have been captain for the final.

The captaincy issue at the weekend was weird. Doris did approach Pearce repeatedly but the relationship was damaged from the off. On their very first interaction after becoming captain (which I think was the Marx turnover in the 22), Doris questioned something (I think it was the MVS not rolling which prevented Beirne and Doris from getting access to Marx/the ball). Pearce immediately spoke to him like a child "Don't make me go, don't make me go. That's now three times. Next time we go 10 metres". Image of that incident is below. That's MVS with his legs sticking out as he kills the ball whilst Marx is on it. Beirne is slapping him on the back too, highlighting the issue but no official calls it.

Doris probably should have been more selective in approaching Pearce but there were 3 incidents within 10 minutes that he could feel his side were fairly harshly treated. I'd expect a captain to be speaking to the ref at any single one of them. But Pearce was on edge in all of them and spoke fairly poorly to him on each.

• The Marx turnover where he chastised Doris in their first interaction since he became the on field captain as per above
• The disallowed try. Doris waited alongside the officials and, when he heard the try being disallowed was waved away and told "I'll explain to you, just let me do my bit." Doris waits and asks "Does he not get cleared to ground as he's hooking it?" and Pearce says something unintelligible "That's not….xxxx" and returns downfield.
• The slap down at the lineout before Casey's removal. This is where Pearce completely dismissed Doris and told him to stop asking him questions. It was a completely legitimate approach. It was a clear slapdown by PSDT right in front of the officials. Doris was asking was it not a deliberate knock on. He should have left it as there was no way it was going to go back and be reversed but I can understand the frustration as

Any one of those incidents, I'd be disappointed in any captain not trying to interject. On each occasion, Doris was respectful in his demeanour and language but needed to know when he was not going to get anything and Pearce was not in the mood for any discussion. Even for his disallowed try, Doris said he had grounded it for a split second (and replays appeared to confirm this) but you could sense the annoyance from Pearce at having to check it and he was very curt and direct in his instruction to Whitehouse which, I felt, probably played a part in how quickly they checked that and dismissed it.

I'm not sure any change of captain would be beneficial at this point. Leave POM in place for this weekend, obviously but I don't think there's any Irish player who wouldn't have been growing frustrated with the decisions and lack of engagement from the officials in these situations. Beirne was absolutely exasperated with Raynal against Exeter I recall and had to be eventually waved away after speaking to him repeatedly. I recall a few years back where POM (and it's an absolute credit to him) removed himself from speaking with the referee and asked Stander to communicate instead as he was losing his cool and the relationship was damaged.

What one of the podcasts mentioned (and I think it's fairly reasonable) is that we seem to have a particular issue with the English referees. These guys obviously work together and often operate as a team. No different to any colleagues, they'll discuss their experiences after matches and in training together. I wonder if there isn't something of a belief between them that the Leinster/Ireland teams need to be kept in check and to be strict in your dealings with them. I normally find Pearce an affable operator with good communication but he was extremely snippy at the weekend.

The Boks are at it again now with Bongi claiming Ireland were trying to play "tricks" in the scrum. The poor South Africans only want a fair scrum i.e calls to go their way

And Karl Dickson definitely has a view on the Irish scrum.

So whatever issues there are with English referees it’s clear that talking to them doesn’t work.

Solution: stop talking to them like normal people.

Start talking to them like your back in school.

‘Sir, May I ask a question please?’

They love that stuff and it’s guaranteed to at least get a better response.

I think that despite the moronic posters at the match with Rassies in your head it actually really bothers the Saffers that they are in fact not only not in the Irish teams head but actually the Irish team is living in theirs rent free, all the noise is coming from one side whilst the other doesn’t get involved.

Was it Jackman who was saying the last day maybe we are the nice Irishmen an ref thinks they can talk to players like that

Maybe a bit of Sexton fire might get some respect, Sexton for all the complaints people had about his would never allow a ref to speak to him like that and would get his point over

The "I know you hate me but you have to talk to me"(or something like that) comment

No I wouldn't say so, probably applicable for most fanbases in most sports though. Reffings a tough gig

That's what Joel jutge in world rugby is for. He's elite men's officials manager or something like that. Wouldn't be a meeting with any refs directly

Not really, his point was that Sexton and Paulie had the presence that refs would listen to them. It seems like the Irish player at the moment are been told to shut up. This is a few times now over the last few months this has happened and not just to Doris.

Sexton was a good communicator, the refs would listen to him and he got his point across. People didn't like his style of communication but then again some people would complain about Sexton if he helped an old person across the road.

Paulie was just as forceful at times, BOD never had to be because he was BOD.

If a ref turns arounds and scolds the captain like a child well then I thin the captain has the right to put the ref straight. The captain has to have the ability to talk to the ref, end of. If the ref can't have the ability to discuss with the captain incidents then IRFU need to raise huge concerns with the communication ability of these refs/

I do agree that Ireland players have got a little mouthy and I seen it in the last warm up game when Barnes shut them down, I thin the rest of the team need to keep it down and leave it to the captain to talk.

A good point I heard yesterday, can't remember whic podcast, was the suggestion that Doris was talking too much before been made captain, then when he was captain the ref had enough. SO maybe they need to look at having a player as captain who is only playing half the game going forward, is this the right direction? i know others do it like SA but it doesn't seem to work for Ireland at the moment

A captain isn’t going to get the ref to reverse a decision like a ruck penalty unless there is something dangerous missed off the ball, and I don’t think refs are inclined to go looking at potential knock ons such as the Du Toit lineout knock on unless there is an opportunity due to an immediate break in play or when a try has been scored.

Captains have to be smart about raising issues; there are issues where a simple comment is appropriate when pointing something out, it won’t change that decision but may affect the next decision by making the ref more aware to watch for it, and there are times when a TMO review could be requested due to foul play that was missed or if a try was scored. Unfortunately refs are under pressure to keep proceedings moving so if a TMO says something refs are usually quick to run with it and try to restart the play asap, it would be unusual for a ref to ask the TMO to review something again for example the disallowed try to check if the TMO missed the neck roll. I’d also sympathise with the TMO when camera angles aren’t clear, like the Doris try grounding or the foot in touch when Lowe kept the ball in and led to them getting a try.

Whoever captains Ireland needs to get better at knowing what to raise and how to raise issues without getting dragged into discussions as the ref will not be interested in players continuously distracting them with stuff the ref will not do anything about.