Six Nations: Referee Jonker told to be vigilant of blockers

Published on Tuesday 9 March 2010 22:19

ANDY Robinson was full of praise for England's improvement under his former skipper Martin Johnson yesterday, despite the criticism that has come his way, but the Scotland coach was also quick to flag up illegal play he believes England have been getting away with.

It can be taken for read Robinson has studied every facet of England's play in this RBS Six Nations Championship, and before it, and one aspect he believes referees are missing is their increasing use of blocking runners.

It is a common ploy in Australia, where decoy runners were first used to fool defenders and metamorphosed into blocking runners simply to stop defenders getting to the ball-carriers. England's Kiwi centre Riki Flutey is particularly adept at it.

Decoys are allowed, blockers are not, and Robinson was not slow yesterday in drawing attention to it, pointing to the influence of England's Aussie coach Brian Smith, and urging Saturday's South African referee Marius Jonker to be aware of the move.

He stated: "They score a number of first-phase tries through well-executed plays, off lineouts and scrums, but I'd like to put forward here that I believe there are blockers in place. Of all the teams we watch their first-phase play and the way they run their plays off lineouts and scrums is pretty effective. That's through Brian Smith and the way he coaches. There is an Australian influence – the blockers that get put in place to free up space for their runners.

"We'll need the referee to be very strong because they have runners in place in front of the ball that are blocking our defenders and it's vital that we don't get blocked and the referee picks that up. If the referee doesn't see it he can't give it, so we need him to be aware of those players who are casually running in front of our players a bit like American Football.

"Anybody who is in front of the ball is out of the game and should not have an influence on what's happening. I will be speaking to him (Jonker] about it."

Robinson has already urged his players to learn how to control the breakdown area and take it out of the hands of referees, but he knows the difficulty he faces in outsmarting the England defence without worrying about defenders being taken out off the ball.

So the experienced coach has ensured that everyone from match officials to supporters and commentators will be looking for blockers now. Time will tell if it was a smart move.

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