Naka Drotske speaks up against scrum penalties
Naka Drotske, the Cheetahs coach, has expressed his concern publically regarding the numerous scrum penalties his team gifted. He reckons these penalties to be a major factor in the defeat in Durban against Sharks.
The Cheetahs are generally considered to be a frightening side, but were alarmed after getting profoundly fined at the scrum time under soaked circumstances. Cheetahs lost to Sharks by an alarming 24-9 score difference.
Naka Drotske said, “It's not easy to say something about the scrums straight off. I would like to see a video of the game on Monday to be competent enough to give a proper conclusion.”
Drotske didn’t seem so happy at most of the referee’s decisions, but also blamed his side for a few blunders they evidently made. Talking about his judgment that he will give after viewing the videos, he added, “Once I have been through the videos, we can
then make a decision whether the penalties were reasonable or not. It's not easy to say something about it now, especially not after you lost and are still emotional.”
Drotske was looking forward to talk this out with the officials, but didn’t want make a quick move. He wants to think out his strategy well, before fronting the people who matter. He strongly believes that few of the decisions were totally over the top and
can’t be justified at all. He is preparing a report with his colleagues, which will be submitted to Andre Watson the referee manager for South Africa.
He bewailed his forward’s lack of ability to read the referee’s mind at the scrum time. He said, “The referees are very stringent on early engagement. There is a fine line because you'd like to win the engagement to be able to scrum well.”
Adding to his frustrating comments he said, “When you are penalised for that at the first two scrums, you are frequently late after that and are subjugated by your adversary. The penalties absolutely had an upshot.”
Though, it wasn’t so mature of him to give out such statement, but for a neutral rugby viewer, there were some doubts in a few decisions. Things like these should be handled with care and dealt with caution. If IRB takes notice of these statements, Drotske
might be facing a few problems. History has proved that whether the decisions by referee were right or wrong, they can’t be challenged afterwards and all the rugby personals, which went up against them, had to face the music in different intensities according
to the situation.
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