The Farce of France!

Various reasons have meant that I haven't updated my blog in the last few weeks, but rest assured, some things have still been annoying me.

1. The Farce of France

Rugby is my favourite sport. I love  all sports. I am a huge fan of football and cricket, but rugby has always been my first love. Due to my job, I can't really blog too much about rugby, but the behavior of certain individuals in the postponed France v Ireland match drove me mad.

Pearson - Scapegoat

For those who missed it, the game got called off about 10 minutes before the scheduled kick off time (9pm GMT) due to parts of the pitch being frozen. The blame for this was then passed squarely onto referee Dave Pearson by the French Federation. The referee is responsible for one thing and one thing only when doing a pitch inspection and that is the safety of the players. Nothing else should come into consideration. Pearson correctly said that if the safety of the players couldn't be guaranteed then the game can not take place. That is just the referee doing his job correctly. Of course it is a disappointment for the fans present, particularly those travelling from far away, but the referee should not be blamed. I would imagine that if he was allowed, he would have called the game off about 6 hours earlier.



The FFR on the other hand have made themselves look ridiculous. Straight away after the game the passed the blame onto Pearson. Correct me if I'm wrong, but I doubt Dave Pearson scheduled the game for a late evening kick off. I don't think Dave Pearson looked at the long term weather forecast and decided not to move the kick off time forward. I'm pretty sure Dave Pearson wasn't responsible for the Stade De France not having undersoil heating.

In a couple of weeks the game will be replayed. None of the players will be missing through serious injury. That is thanks to the correct call being made. The bigwigs in the FFR should think about how they have acted from the comfort of their luxury seats.