Warren Gatland: “I was a consultant to international referees, but now I’m thinking about the Rugby World Cup”

After weeks of rumors and hypotheses about his future, Warren Gatland breaks his silence. The New Zealand coach, sacked last March by Wales in the middle of the Six Nations (in his second “era” at the helm of the Dragons, ed.), chose the columns of the Telegraph to talk about himself and what not many people knew: playing the role of game consultant for World Rugby referees.

Warren Gatland: “I was a consultant to international referees, but now I’m thinking about the Rugby World Cup”

“I’ve gone over to the dark side of the force – he jokes -. In recent months I have worked with the referees, assistants, TMOs and the referees who look after the bunker, seeing things from another perspective and also better understanding how they work and the weight of the criticism to which they are subjected”.

“I’ll say it straight away: the regulation has some gray areas, more than anything else I would define them as “subjective” and little can be done about that. What we are trying to focus on instead is the fact of arriving at the Rugby World Cup 2027 with clear rules that have been in place for at least a year, without experiments in the last half of the year”.

“The areas of work at the moment concern: the management of the breakdown and offside positions, the positioning of the referee during the match, checking the positions of the other players not involved in the scrum and touchout and safety in both the static and dynamic phases with the management of tackles”.

Then he added: “I told World Rugby and the referees one thing: when you make a mistake, it’s not very constructive to defend the decision to the point of exhaustion. Better to go in front of the cameras and admit the mistake, without problems: you create less controversy and you get more respect.”

On things he would change: “I would like Bunker and TMO to work together. Let me explain: if the match director needs a review to understand which card to intervene with in a certain situation, he is interrupting the match. What I would do is to immediately give a yellow card to the perpetrator of the foul and then leave TMO and Bunker to discuss the degree of the foul.”

On tackles: “In my opinion, a player who is tackled, in any way, should leave the ball immediately, get up and then possibly play the ball again: clearly, not as happens now. Confusion often arises for both the tackled player and the tackler when playing the ball again.”

At 50-22: “I like the rule, it has opened up new offensive horizons. I would extend it in these terms: to take advantage of the 50-22 it shouldn’t be necessary to play the ball only in one’s own half of the pitch towards the opponents’ 22, but I would give teams the opportunity to bring it back into their own half of the pitch even after passing it to make the game spectacular and open up attacking spaces.”

Finally on his current activity and projection towards the future: “Everyone says to me ‘congratulations on the new job’. No, I’m not the new coach of Georgia. When I concluded my experience with Wales I told myself that I needed a break and so I did. Steve Tandy? I wish him the best, I know that the reconstruction will not be easy: it will take time and space to make mistakes and recreate a strong team.
Is the Rugby World Cup 2027 approaching? I don’t deny it, I feel it too. I would like to be able to use my experience, also because I know that it is one of the few periods where the coaches have the team at their disposal for several weeks. Let’s see if the right opportunity comes along, otherwise I’ll look at other things: maybe even thinking about a club.”

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