Bryce Lawrence Nominated for top NZ Ref award

[TRF C A Iversen]

First of all, it's not a SuperSport page, it's a News24 page.

Secondly, this is why I don't like News24, because they have a particularly negative user base and they always do this kind of ****, insults and the like. All of them are a bunch of media whores.

Obviously heineken posted it on here to stir a bit, wasn't in the best taste but I'd doubt anybody's sense of humour who actually likes Jeff Dunham's puppet routine.

Every nations has those fans who spew this kind of crap and its a worrying sign that this is becoming a trend in rugby all over the world. I mean in 2007 Barnes was getting death threats for goodness sake. 2011 has been particularly bad. Players and fans alike have been at refs. This ref bashing needs to stop.

Look... Bryce Lawrence had a massive impact on the game, of that I have no doubt. I was angry too. I got over it. Most of SA got over it, we had a Currie Cup going on.
Yet this extremist pocket of fans carried on with the stir like this one fake article from The Australian (newspaper) and all those edited pics. Honestly, get a life. These are the same fans that only rock up when a WC is on when there is a focus on rugby. I HATE fair weather fans but they add to rugby's coffers so I just have to deal with them.

I personally saw this article on News24 and didn't read it cause I knew exactly that it was gonna bash Lawrence. I believe in voting with clicks when it comes to news websites. If I see something I don't like/support or whatever I don't click, and I urged other people to do the same. The media puts these articles up because it gets those all important clicks. If these weren't so well read and responded to then they wouldn't put them up. But no, this particular article got lots of clicks, and some people from NZ even made the effort to register with them to post a comment. Score.

Look at the bigger picture people! Does getting all emotional and resentful about one guys calling NZ'ers wife beaters really matter to you? C'mon guys, lets not bring this kind of negativity here.

Yeah, I dunno where the whole "Supersport" thing came from. I noticed it last night that I had that wrong, but I think it originally came from someone else earlier in the thread. Not sure though.

Also, it's not just "one guy calling NZ'ers wife beaters", that can be ignored as one idiot. The point is that there are dozens of users stating things like "we would DEFINITELY have beaten New Zealand and the cup if it wasn't for Bryce Lawrence". That type of thing from 3-4 respondents is a sample of arrogance that could just be a small pocket of any populace. It's a heck of a lot more than that in that articles responses. Some are telling us we are a nation of cheats, that we should be ashamed, that we've robbed a nation of something that would unify them all. There are many dozens of thumbs ups to the comments that speak in these ways and a fair few thumbs down to the few foreigners who've dared respond.

On top of all that? Not one person saying that they are a South African and they think the others should be ashamed of themselves. It tacit agreement with those views by a huge chunk (nearly all) of the readership, which suggests somethings wrong.

You've got a point though, it's just that when someone brings an article of such insulting negativity to a thread and people respond, it's hardly their fault. I agree that heineken must've brought this thread about to stir and when you set out to stir people up on the internet, then it's trolling. I guess we've just inadverently been feeding the troll.

Still, don't mistake passionate debate for me really giving a damn about the whole thing. I'm not all uptight or angry about this, just have been typing in a blunt to the point style as I haven't had time to soften it up with smiley emoticons and the like.

As an aside, isn't it good to see that pretty much every New Zealander you speak to agrees Bryce had a bad game? Still, having a bad game by no means assures that the victory would've happened for South Africa, just that the possibility is there that the game might've been totally different if more stringent policing of the breakdown had been established in the first 20mins. From there either side could have won. For now and forever now though, we're stuck with the result as New Zealanders have been in past instances.

I guess at least this thread has kept a bit of discussion going, and that's got to be good for stimulating a little readership on here if nothing else. :lol:

 

[User1245]

Yeah I'm also confused as to how NZ'ers are being labeled cheats after that game? Its petty and even more than that it doesn't even connect.

I also agree that trying to take away a teams hard earned WC victory, for something that wasn't even connected to them, is a douche bag thing to do. But then why did you C.A. say in your first post that 1995 was "Rainbow Nation Robbery"?
Not very gracious at all, and in fact very insulting to SA fans.

 

[smartcooky]

To be completely honest, I think Bryce Lawrence has it in him to be a top-class referee, he just had a bad year. I hope he will pick up where he left off. Stu Dickinson already had to deal with this ****, maybe we can just increase the area of which the TMO can rule... It will give some refs a break for a change. The way some refs are being dealt with, it seems to be more and more like football...

Ezequiel, I appreciate what you are trying to say, but really, I don't think he is a very good referee. He may be competent most of the time, but he has a very poor relationship with the players, of all teams. They simply don't have any confidence in him.

Bryce Lawrence's performance in the South Africa v Australia quarter-final, was a virtual carbon copy of Wayne Barnes' dismal effort in the quarter-final in 2007. I hear kiwi fans go on and on about the "forward pass" but really, it was not Wayne Barnes' call, it was Kaplan's.. he was in line with it and should have called it.

The similarities between those two performances are quite amazing when you view them one after another.

1. Both referees were little more than spectators, resembling rabbits caught in the headlights more than they did international referees.

2. Both referees allowed one side to infringe with impunity. Barnes allowed the France virtually unlimited offsides, Lawrence allowed unlimited infringing by Australia (escpecially Pocock) at the breakdown.

3. Both referees appeared unwilling to make a big, match-changing call near the end of the game.

And interestingly, both referees came from a country who would have been the losing team's next opponent!

South African fans will now have a real understanding of how Kiwi fans felt ripped off in 2007, and Kiwis understand your pain now, because we've been there.

Barnes still has this fatal flaw in his game of being unable to make the big call under pressure. who remembers Contpomi charging from a blatantly offside position at Dan Parks' attempted match winning dropped goal in the Scotland v Argentina match? Or how about all the South African ruck & maul infringements that went unpunished in the last minutes of the match against Wales, that would have given the Welsh a match-winning penalty kick?

Bryce Lawrence has been poor at other times too, he had shockers in the S15 matches between the Crusaders and the Highlanders in Nelson, and again in the Crusaders v Sharks at the same venue, His general treatment of the Sharks in that mactn was appalling, culminating in that ridiculous scrum penalty against The Beast because "he moved". That was just pure Bulls Hit. But by far his worst clanger was in the 2009 Lions tour of South Africa, where, a Assistant Referee, he clearly saw Schalk Burger deliberately poke his finger into an opponent's eye, and recommended only a yellow card for what was a stone cold red card offence; another example of him bottling a big call under pressure.

 

[TRF C A Iversen]

Yeah I'm also confused as to how NZ'ers are being labeled cheats after that game? Its petty and even more than that it doesn't even connect.

I also agree that trying to take away a teams hard earned WC victory, for something that wasn't even connected to them, is a douche bag thing to do. But then why did you C.A. say in your first post that 1995 was "Rainbow Nation Robbery"?
Not very gracious at all, and in fact very insulting to SA fans.

Yeah you mean this part.

If you guys can go on about this, then you are legitimising New Zealanders blaming being violently ill (which many of our players were however it happened - video shows Jeff Wilson throwing up in a bucket on the side-line during the game) on your "Rainbow Nation Robbery" in 1995. Once again, you guys were still close to being beating by a weakened team!

Somewhat poorly worded from myself here Steve-o. The whole reason for it was to make two points.

1. In 1995 more than half of our side was undoubtably ill. However that occured, (I'm not a believer that they were deliberately poisoned at all, I equate it more to what can happen touring anywhere, particularly to cricket sides touring India), some food just wasn't great on one occasion. That's life.

To use that fact to say that it might've been a completely different game if held on another day is fair. ie: New Zealand may still have lost, but both sides may have played a very different game (maybe more attacking or just as tight in a different way perhaps). New Zealand might've won it. Still, we'll all never know. So, it falls into the category of fair comment, but irrelevant and well worth dropping and let history be what it was! South Africa played like champions, won, and were champions.

2. My second point I tried to make (where I think I fell down the most), was to show an arrogant, unaccepting, distainful and what I'd call absolutely low point of view, using terms like "Rainbow Nation Robbery", and subtlely implying that the New Zealand team were posioned and weakened, so I could show just how offensive the comments on the linked site were to me. It absolutely seeks to remove the dignity and legitimacy of the winning side and that's exactly what has happened to New Zealand in this instance on that particular article.

Believe me I realise that's just a small segment of South African fans, I really do. Of course, all they've done is show the class of some of the South African posters we have here by way of comparison, after all, most have been pretty gracious other than towards Mr Lawrence and haven't insisted there was a conspiracy. The mindless screechers of Sport24 on the other hand do the opposite.



Finally, just in case someone tells me to let it go or get over it, all I'm doing is responding to points made back towards me.

 

[TRF_heineken]

I have always had sympathy for the All Blacks after the 2007 debacle with Wayne Barnes, and believe me, us South Africans have on countless times been on the receiving end of bad calls going against us. The QF was just another one to add on our list.

I can see now what Sam Owen meant by me having some sort of hatred towards Bryce Lawrence, as to my other thread I started about him. in this case though, it was merely the fact that I was on Sport24's website immediately when they posted the article, and I knew nobody else would do it as soon as i could.

I did find it funny, but I can see that some NZ fans would take it as distasteful. But what we all must realize is that these types of articles are for sensation, to get attention, and for that, this journo did a great job. I guess he falls along with Bryce in the category of love him or hate him, he's here to stay.

As for the wife-beater saying, well that was a joke, what happened to good old disses? it happens on the rugby/cricket/soccer field as well as in your local bar, even on the bloody airplane. but clearly the sense of humour is different from person to person.

glad to see everyone to be calm and still commenting.

P.S. next year is the end of Pieter De Villiers (not the coach, the guy who got a couple of slaps from Richie Mccaw) ban from rugby stadiums... just a thought...

 

[smartcooky]

P.S. next year is the end of Pieter De Villiers (not the coach, the guy who got a couple of slaps from Richie Mccaw) ban from rugby stadiums... just a thought...

Do you mean Pieter van Zyl?

 

[Seaton]

Goeie ou Piet...

So Dickinson is gone for good? Crikey what the hell are the Aussies doing for refs these days? I reckon their guy on the Sevens circuit is a good ref, as well as the Saffa one Stuart Berry.

In fact there are a couple of refs that put in decent shifts in the Sevens, which is all the more remarkable because of the pace at which it is played

 

[TRF_heineken]

Do you mean Pieter van Zyl?

Yeah, sorry, I meant him.