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'He certainly doesn't stop talking': Retiring Kiwi official Glen Jackson names the most memorable player he's refereed

Retiring referee Glen Jackson in action in Super Rugby earlier this year. (Photo by Hannah Peters/Getty Images)

Retiring New Zealand referee Glen Jackson has come across a multitude of players in his decade-long officiating career, but nobody has been more memorable than All Blacks halfback Aaron Smith.

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Jackson revealed on Friday that he is retiring from refereeing after the personal disappointment of missing out on selection for last year’s World Cup in Japan.

In a statement released by New Zealand Rugby, the 44-year-old said “the time is right” for him to move on, although he still hopes to be involved in rugby over the coming years.

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The former Chiefs and Bay of Plenty first-five, who also played over 100 times for Saracens in the Premiership and represented the Maori All Blacks in 2004, hung up his playing boots in 2010 and made a swift transition into officiating that year.

Jackson made his first-class debut in the Heartland Championship, and made his Super Rugby debut just a matter of months later in 2011.

He would go on to take charge of 88 matches at that level, adding to his 60 matches in the Mitre 10 Cup and 32 test matches, which includes four appearances at the 2015 World Cup in England.

However, it’s during his time in Super Rugby where Jackson would have encountered Smith while playing for the Highlanders, where his competitiveness was clear to see for the outgoing referee.

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“I always enjoyed reffing Aaron Smith,” Jackson told Stuff.

“He’s a class player and I enjoy everything about how he plays. He certainly doesn’t stop talking and some refs might find that quite hard.”

As a former player, Jackson believed his own experiences helped him with players as chirpy as Smith, which he said wasn’t an uncommon trait for a halfback.

“The beauty of being a player, you learn they’re not the best referees,” he said.

“You realise it’s in the heat of the moment, how competitive he is, and he’d always come up pretty quick afterwards to say he probably went too far there. But I enjoyed his banter and how he played the game.”

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On the flip side, Jackson also knew to acknowledge where he had made a mistake with whistle in hand, which is an attribute he believed he garnered during his playing days.

“As a referee, you’re always going to make a mistake and it’s never that bad to say ‘sorry, boys, I clearly made a mistake there’.”

Jackson will stay on board with New Zealand Rugby as mentor for younger officials until March, and will travel to South Africa this weekend for a SANZAAR referee camp.

It isn’t known what his next career step will be, but after 25 years of distinguished involvement as a player and referee, another role within the rugby fraternity seems imminent.

In other news:

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Flankly 2 hours ago
'Absolute madness': Clive Woodward rips into Borthwick in wake of NZ loss

Borthwick is supposed to be the archetypical conservative coach, the guy that might not deliver a sparkling, high-risk attacking style, but whose teams execute the basics flawlessly. And that's OK, because it can be really hard to beat teams that are rock solid and consistent in the rugby equivalent of "blocking and tackling".


But this is why the performance against NZ is hard to defend. You can forgive a conservative, back-to-basics team for failing to score tons of tries, because teams like that make up for it with reliability in the simple things. They can defend well, apply territorial pressure, win the set piece battles, and take their scoring chances with metronomic goal kicking, maul tries and pick-and-go goal line attacks.


The reason why the English rugby administrators should be on high alert is not that the English team looked unable to score tries, but that they were repeatedly unable to close out a game by executing basic, coachable skills. Regardless of how they got to the point of being in control of their destiny, they did get to that point. All that was needed was to be world class at things that require more training than talent. But that training was apparently missing, and the finger has to point at the coach.


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