The Durban rugby referees society’s law meeting today might turn out to be more interesting than usual. For Saturday’s high profile Glenwood – Westville inter-schools matches, two regular and experienced referees were allegedly bumped from their respective 1st XV and u15A match assignments so that more senior referees could take charge. The exact reasons are yet to be confirmed but there is a suggestion that the 1st XV decision was based on the initial referee being considered inadequate – a reason which may have his colleagues up in arms. In the under-15A instance the replacement was well-respected former international referee Marius Jonker, who as a result of the decision ended up reffing his own son’s match. As irregular as it appears, the one-sided nature of that under-15 game basically meant that supporters did not see a need to question his influence.
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@GreenBlooded: They say if you ignore someone they will go away. Let’s hope.
@umbiloburger:
Or someone desperately seeking attention. ANY attention. That’s why the best thing to do is not respond and hopefully he will go and troll News24 or somewhere else.
@Bonthuis: I guess your mom made you a nice Sarmie and gave you tuck money for school today!!! You sound like a spoilt teenager with an excuse for everything. Thank goodness we don’t judge Westville by your behavior. Every school has 5% of their boys that have the potential to ruin it for the rest. Guess which group you fall under?
This sounds like it was probably the right decision, too many games against Glenwood over the last 10 years where dodgy calls have cost Westville the game in tightly contested games. Glad justice finally prevailed!
@beet: I am not involved in the referee society and as such I cannot comment on how they work. What I do know is that the appointment of all A team games at GW are appointed by DBN REfs Society. GW do not request specific referees. Changes like these certainly aren’t the norm. But I am sure that Dean would have explained the situation to referees.
@beet: I am not involved in the referee society and as such I cannot comment on how they work. What I do know is that the appointment of all A team games at GW are appointed by DBN REfs Society. Changes like these cert
From my understanding Marius had to get back to Richard’s Bay to support his daughter in event and he was also committed to ref a local game there too. I could be wrong, but this is possibly why he did not take the 1st team game.
@umbiloburger: With Marius Jonker being a former international ref, if I had a laaitie playing in that game I’d probably be very excited about the prospect of him taking charge and might even pitch up with a camcorder to capture the occasion. It is an occasion to remember.
But when I try to imagine this matter from Marius’ point of view, he surely had to volunteer to ref on the Saturday to be considered in the first place. So what happened next? Did he get told he’d been assigned to the u15A game and that the ref that was going to handle it will be given a lower team game? At that point did Marius says look there’s a conflict of interests, my boy plays in that u15 team, let me rather swap and officiate another game? Or is it that Marius specifically asks for that game knowing that his independence would not be compromised by the fact that his son was a member of one of the teams? And if so two more questions again:
1. is it the norm for a (more experienced) ref to just come in and replace someone who’d been given the assignment?
2. why did Marius want that specific game, did he not have confidence in the official that was going to handle it or was there another reason?
So many questions. The facts would be nice.
I emailed both Dean and Hennie of the refs society earlier this week asking for assistance. Neither replied. Tomorrow I will email Pete Smith and ask if he can assist to provide clarification on what really happened.
Why did it happen so late in the day. What pressing engagements did Archie and MJ have that were cancelled that they suddenly became available. Or, why were they not appointed right from the start. And if you’re talking about seniority (you are, I assume), why was MJ not preferred to Archie for the 1st game, avoiding the inevitable raised eyebrows when MJ reffed his sons match. For the record, and before its raised as a smokescreen, I have no issues with either appointments, just with the timing and the apparent lack of logic.
@Whistle:I guess the question is, is this kind of thing the norm for the Society. To appoint referees and then replacement with more senior referees later in the week?
I really don’t see a problem about the appointments. Two very adequate ref’s were taken of to make space for 2 provincial referees. This happens when boks return to provincial rugby. They play and the second best move to the bench.
I can hardly believe they’re going to even discuss their decision to appoint the people they did, they don’t strike me as being particularly introspective. If there’s smoke then it might be a different fire completely. Why do I think there’s more to this?
Pulling the two refs has done nobody any favours, whether there was a Refs Society perception of inadequacy or not, they have planted the seed now. It’s tough enough being a ref without the ref hierarchy themselves making it worse. Cool heads and very carefully considered action called for.
@Rugger fan: agreed….suffice to say there were a few WV spectators grumpy about Jonkers appointment and true to form of yesteryear they couldn’t resist a chirp. Silly humans!
I assume the lack of feedback shows this is less of a conspiracy than expected?