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All Black lock clears up South African pitch invasion

Former All Blacks lock Chris Jack has shed light on an infamous pitch invasion in Durban 16 years after the fact.

Back in 2002 Springboks fan Pieter van Zyl charged onto the field and tackled Irish referee David McHugh – dislocating his shoulder – during a Test match in Durban.

All Blacks flanker Richie McCaw eventually brought down the pitch invader, and he left with a bloody nose.

Talking to Radio Sport about the incident, 67-Test All Black Jack admitted he and teammate Dave Hewitt may have caused McHugh’s injury.

“I just thought it was their second-five coming into talk to the referee or halfback about something. And then I popped my head up and there’s this big fat bugger on the referee. A bit of a shock,” Jack told Radio Sport. “We got a bit of a surprise and then we saw AJ Venter and Richie McCaw on top of someone. So myself and Dave Hewitt saw the referee under there and saw what was going on and we tried to pull the poor referee out and I think we may have dislocated his shoulder.”

“Which eventually won us the game because we got a new referee and refereed a bit different and we went onto win.”

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ovJBF0xV2XA

The game wasn’t decided until the final ten minutes, but the All Blacks ultimately came out winners 30-23 with English assistant referee Chris White taking over for McHugh.

Jack said that later encounters with McHugh were slightly awkward.

“We started pulling him out and he started squealing a little bit. Games after that I went to shake his hand and he wouldn’t give me the time of day but he was all over Richie, so he obviously held a wee grudge against me for pulling him out.”

Pitch invader van Zyl stopped play for ten minutes and after the match was subsequently banned from attending any matches under the control of the South African Rugby Union.

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J
JW 40 minutes ago
'The Wallabies only have themselves to blame': How the Lions sunk Australia in Melbourne

Cameron Woki picked at the base of a ruck and jumped/dived over. That would clearly now be penalised.

But the Sheehan try is different to my eye. It starts from a tap penalty, he drives forward, the two WB defenders go low for a tackle in the assumption Sheehan will go to ground. He does not, but seeing the hole now left dives through it. In this case surely there is zero danger there.

World Rugby’s terminology/interpretation recently (shared again after this) is that it’s ok to hurdle/dive (that includes over, say a ruck, which we have seen this many times even in this years SR) to score a try, but it’s not (OK) to avoid a tackle. I can’t remember the one you describe (which may have been where their clarification came from) but that would sound OK. Sheehan definitely was playing the rope-a-dope and dived to avoid being tackled (can’t call it tackled really, just blocked/stopped lol), so shouldn’t have been awarded (I wasn’t aware of this last definition so just thought it was a very smart move). Was it premeditated? I’m not sure, but he could definitely have collected someones head if that was the case. And I guess even if he saw the space, I guess it’s not something they can allow as others might try it and get it terribly wrong?


Well summed up Miz. I have been thinking the whole situation of events that lead to this type of sneaky move is the problem, particularly as it relates to the difficulty and effort defenders now go to stop such situations (like say Slippers try), where players go extremely low to drive from meters out (and in most cases plays just trying to dive under). It’s also ugly business seeing attempt after attempt to go in under the tacklers, especially with them not really being able to perform a ‘tackle’ at all. I would simply give the defenders their goal line. All they need is some part of the body on or behind, and this will stop the play (being the fuel to this fire) from being attempted I reckon.

36 Go to comments
M
Mzilikazi 1 hour ago
'The Wallabies only have themselves to blame': How the Lions sunk Australia in Melbourne

I get where you are coming from,Om. And there was a case when that French under strength team came out to Australia. Cameron Woki picked at the base of a ruck and jumped/dived over. That would clearly now be penalised.


But the Sheehan try is different to my eye. It starts from a tap penalty, he drives forward, the two WB defenders go low for a tackle in the assumption Sheehan will go to ground. He does not, but seeing the hole now left dives through it. In this case surely there is zero danger there.


Both WB heads are well clear below. There would have been far more danger had Sheehan also dropped low, as he had done on one, or was it two occasions in the game.


I just can’t see his movement as a jump. There is virtually no vertical element, it is say only 5% upwards. Surely at 95% horizontal, that won’t be penalised, not even seriously looked at ?


“It is different to the sideline touchdown on the wing”. You are the only person in hundreds of posts I have read who brings that up. I have been thinking of that as well, but not commented till now prompted by you. And you are correct, it is in most cases very different, being a side on tackle, not head on. But still, it is often more a jump than a dive. I would not advocate for penalising…..some wonderful tries scored that way, and the danger element is generally not excessive, at least not for head injuries.

36 Go to comments
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