Referee Chris Pollock has taken a refreshingly innovative approach to Friday’s heavyweight Super 15 start between the Blues and Crusaders at Eden Park.
He emailed rival coaches, Pat Lam and Todd Blackadder, with his views on how he will control the match, especially at the contentious scrum and tackle phases.
“I just said to them, ‘we have an opportunity to set a standard and get the competition off on a good positive note’ and sent them a couple of my thoughts on how I wanted to deal with the process at scrum time so they knew where I was coming from,” Pollock said.
“And then there was the tackle area and work at the breakdown.”
Pollock has toyed with the idea since he began top-grade refereeing and had tried it once before, in the leadup to a test he controlled in Argentina.
“I just thought at least if you give them the information and tell them what you are going to do, and back it up and actually do it, then no one can come back at you and say they didn’t know about it,” he said.
“I’d far rather have it that way where they can come back and point out, ‘you said you were going to rule this way and you never did it,’ as opposed to them saying ‘we didn’t realise you were going to do it this way’.”
Pollock was in charge of the Blues and Crusaders in the opening round last year with the Blues winning 24-22 with a late driving try to captain Keven Mealamu.
“For me, that was one of the best games of Super rugby that I refereed and I put a lot of that down to the two teams being so positive,” he said.
“They both wanted to play footy, got out there and did not muck around. As much as we can step in at scrums and breakdowns, if you have two teams who are prepared to be positive it is a hell of a lot easier.”
Pollock said he had those teams in pre-season games last year so they were familiar with his rulings and match-management whereas Friday would be his initial contact with the sides this year.
He will have Glen Jackson and Mike Fraser as his assistants at Eden Park and Vinny Munro will be the television match official.
Blues loose forward Jerome Kaino was running again at practice yesterday but was not involved in any contact work as his damaged left eye continues to heal. The medical staff are confident he will be ready for the Crusaders after suffering a cut under the eye and a scratched cornea in the side’s final trial game with the Highlanders.
Utility Lachie Munro and George Moala will not be available because of ankle and shoulder problems while Lam and his selectors have to balance how best to use some of the squad who are not yet fully conditioned.
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