He’s the Irishman who divided the world on Saturday. Here are five things you might not know about Rugby World Cup referee Alain Rolland.
It’s not the first time he’s sent off a French opponent in a Rugby World Cup match
Red cards are a rare occurrence in rugby – normally it’s a case of ‘You put three men’s lives at risk, take ten minutes in the bin, son’.
So it’s unusual that Rolland has sent off a player against France in a World Cup game in the past. That happened in the 2007 tournament when Jacques Nieuwenhuis of Namibia was at the wrong end of Rolland’s ire. Nieuwenhuis was red-carded for a dangerous tackle on Rolland’s beloved countryman French man-cum-beast Sebastien Chabal.
Not surprisingly, perhaps, Namibia captain Kees Lensing said Rolland “ruined the game” with that decision.
But he’s consistent – he’s sent off Frenchmen for similar tackles in the past too
Florian Fritz, the former France international centre, found himself scratching his head – and giving the finger – when he was red-carded for a drop tackle not at all unlike Sam Warburton’s on Saturday. This was in a Heineken Cup match between Toulouse and Wasps last January.
He’s just celebrated the 10th anniversary of his first international Test as a referee
That milestone passed on September 19th, with Rolland’s international refereeing debut coming at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff for Wales’ 81-9 win over Romania in 2001.
It’s safe to say that he’ll get a whole different reception on his next visit to Wales than he experienced there – if he’s to continue as a referee at all. Some have compared him to Swedish soccer referee Anders Frisk, who retired immediately after a series of controversial decisions during a Champions League tie between Chelsea and Barcelona in 2005 prompted unsavoury threats against his wellbeing.
He’s a world-class referee – but he’d rather still be playing
He won three caps for Ireland and played 40 times for Leinster back in the day, so he’s that rare case of someone who’s reached the top of the game with and without the whistle.
And if truth be told, he probably preferred his playing days to his time as a referee. In a 2007 interview, he said, “You miss the contact [of playing]. Making a tackle and getting a pat on the back from a team-mate, sniping round the back of a scrum, just warming up for the match with the ball in your hand. I miss the ball in hand. You also miss things like scoring tries and winning competitions. But those things cannot go on forever.”
Being despised by an entire rugby-loving country is nothing new
He’s old hat at the old enmity thing, and if Wales hates Rolland en masse today, South Africa knows something of that feeling.
Rolland took charge of a big Tri-Nations match between the Springboks and New Zealand last year, and he made a series of decisions so curious that former South Africa captain Bob Skinstad, commentating on the game for television, said, “He’s only reffing one side here.”
Rolland had sin-binned ‘Boks lock Danie Rossouw for a bit of a shemozzle with All Blacks captain Richie McCaw, a decision which reversed a previous penalty for South Africa and saw New Zealand effectively decide the game in their favour in the ten minutes Rossouw was off the field.
In their report on the game, South African website sport.co.za declared: “McCaw got away with murder, in terms of skirting his own yellow-carding, getting a ‘no more’ warning from Rolland on one occasion and then, remarkably, being handed what was termed an ‘official’ last warning to save his bacon!
“Rolland also took no yellow-card action when Rene Ranger blatantly shoulder-charged Bok fullback Zane Kirchner in the 35th minute.”
The Ranger tackle prompted SuperSport television anchor Darren Scott to say, “If that had been [South Africa’s] Butch James he would have been sent to Siberia.”
Want more? Check out the Twitter verdict on Rolland’s Warburton decision.
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