Time for Barnes to take his leave?

[Shugs]

Must say that was one of the worst officiating I’ve seen in a while. No bias - just complete ineptitude. Missed groundings, knock ons, forward passes, high tackles, offsides. Missed for both teams. Stuff you could see with the naked eye missed under slow mo scrutiny. Barnes’ refusal to apply the laws is just embarrassing.

[westwaleswasp]

Not sure which laws he was not applying. He simply seems to miss so much now.

[NellyWellyWaspy]

Not sure there was any bias. Best team won. For us to get 1 point was, well, a bonus. We simply were not the finished deal.

[westwaleswasp]

Definitely no bias.

[Shugs]

Yes, as I said - completely non biased - just hopeless.

[Eezamarlowman]

Unbelievable how far he has fallen in such a short space of time. Didn’t he nearly retire a while back to focus on his legal career? Probably should have done so based on how he officiates these days

[NellyWellyWaspy]

No bias, but it was a fast intense game. Hard to get everything right. Bottom line, it wasn't his fault we lost.

[Rossm]

No bias, but it was a fast intense game. Hard to get everything right. Bottom line, it wasn't his fault we lost.

I don't think anybody has suggested that, Nelly.

[Bloke in North Dorset]

The frustrating part is the lack of consistency across refs. We don't want them being pedantic about every infringement but they all need to agree what is and isn't going to be allowed.

For example, on Friday CMK, who had a good game, pinged France for building a screen in front of the guy catching the ball. They didn't do it again. Saints must have got away with that tactic 3 or 4 times.

I don't blame Saints, I don't even Blame Barnes. I would like some consistency.

Where I am starting to think Barnes has lost it is the way he treated Josh, as I said in the match thread I thought it was harsh. But the way he responded to questions made me think he realised he'd probably been hasty but he didn't want to back down. He does that quite a bit.

[Rossm]

The frustrating part is the lack of consistency across refs. We don't want them being pedantic about every infringement but they all need to agree what is and isn't going to be allowed.

For example, on Friday CMK, who had a good game, pinged France for building a screen in front of the guy catching the ball. They didn't do it again. Saints must have got away with that tactic 3 or 4 times.

I don't blame Saints, I don't even Blame Barnes. I would like some consistency.

Where I am starting to think Barnes has lost it is the way he treated Josh, as I said in the match thread I thought it was harsh. But the way he responded to questions made me think he realised he'd probably been hasty but he didn't want to back down. He does that quite a bit.

He sometimes makes snap decisions and then doesn't stop to consider he may got it wrong and perhaps needs to revue.

[westwaleswasp]

No bias, but it was a fast intense game. Hard to get everything right. Bottom line, it wasn't his fault we lost.

Absolutely, I don't think anyone here is saying anything like that, just that he seems to miss a lot nowadays. That still leaves a ref who is respected and will get the process right, but one who will miss more than he used to and thus be less accurate as TMOs can only do so much.

[Hymenoptera]

I called this on my Officials thread...he is a joke of a ref. Shugs your spot on, time to retire, he's no longer fit for purpose.
No one care to mention Hodnett? Now I'm all for equal opportunities employment, but you can't employ blind person to do a job that is sight based. She called West getting hit by Alo's knee when it was clearly Willis shoulder. As for the knock on that wasn't...unbelievable

[Mellie]

No one care to mention Hodnett? ... She called West getting hit by Alo's knee when it was clearly Willis shoulder. As for the knock on that wasn't...unbelievable

The West incident was first called by the TV commentator who also picked up the Umaga forward pass in real time. That was only relayed to Barnes well after the try was 'scored'. Again after the commentator said about maybe going back for a look.

So my view is that she picks up what the TV is saying. That's why the Umaga knock on was missed. TV didn't mention it until later.

For the last Saints try it was difficult to say categorically that the pass was knocked on by Saints from the footage shown. However,  the post match analysis showed a long shot from behind the Wasps line and it was clearly deflected by the Saints player. Does the TMO not have access to that and if not why not? If they do then why not use it?

[Hymenoptera]

Her job is to do her job, not tap in to TV comms.
As for the knock on, it's a clear as my arse, there is no argument.

[mike909]

No bias, but it was a fast intense game. Hard to get everything right. Bottom line, it wasn't his fault we lost.

It really isn't too hard to think that a) we were crap and b) the officiating was crap too?

There were loads of forward passes, including two that led to Saints tries, there was a high on Porter scoring that would have been a card and penalty restart and there were more than one high in the first half that didn't even draw comment. And the last penalty was the jackaller binding on the tackled player's body, not the ball....

We didn't lose because of the reffing - but the reffing may wll have altered the outcome of the game.