Rugby: Man in the middle

As the cameras and ref microphones of professional rugby put refereeing decisions under increasing scrutiny, GRAHAM REID talks to Steve Walsh about the pressured life of a whistle-blower.

The laugh at his own misfortune is tempered with audible frustration. Just out for a run round the rocks between Milford and Takapuna, hadn't even warmed up really and ...

"I could just hear it snap and thought, ohh ..."

Steve Walsh Jnr, nursing ligament damage, hobbles across the living room of his new home, his right leg in a fibreglass cast from below the knee to the ankle.

Walsh - the "Jnr" distinguishing him from another of the same name, no relation, who shares his calling - is one of this country's four professional rugby referees, and with the Super 12 competition in full swing he'd prefer to be out on the paddock.

But, sidelined by injury, his distance from the play now offers this man in the middle the opportunity for reflection, particularly about the higher-profile referees now enjoying, or enduring, their time in the limelight.

A decade ago few people other than rugby journalists and diehard fans would know referees' names. Today it's a measure of their profile that they are invited to speak at Rotary meetings. They are variously hailed for their invisibility or damned for a mistake, and their decisions are now broadcast to an international television audience.

"We are more accountable now with professionalism, and that's the way it has to be, but I know from talking to my colleagues that if we let it worry us we'd have been down the gurgler years ago. These days we are refereeing so much we just have to drop the baggage, or the praise, and focus on next week."

Beyond the baying of the crowd, referees' performances are assessed after each game and they receive written reports from the Rugby Union - Walsh feeds his into the home computer for analysis - which calls on former referees' expertise.

"Like, you played some bad advantage twice when you shouldn't have done, flankers unbound from scrum and you didn't pick up, that kind of thing."

They also undergo regular fitness tests, captains and coaches write independent reports on them, and at the end of the year they are all reviewed, not just for on-field performance but for their relationship with the media and their knowledge of rugby law - "and we do talks for referees and rugby clubs, so it's on how well we do those, too."

Indeed, this contact with the clubs is an important part of a referee's role. "We are thought of as an unfortunate consequence of the game, nobody really wants us there, and if we can lift the profile of refereeing then it's better for everyone."

He sees merit in the recently adopted South African practice where referees, like captains and coaches, appear before the media immediately after a game to take questions or explain a decision.

All referees have different styles, he says, but his is to create an on-field relationship with key players such as the first-five or leader of the forwards. Not best buddies after the game, he adds quickly, "but a relationship where I only have to look or give a bit of a smile and he knows he's done something wrong, then I don't have to blow my whistle."

He doesn't socialise with players - "Friendly, but there's no way I'd call any of them a mate" - but if, at a function after a game, players occasionally want to discuss a decision, he's not uncomfortable.

"Because I'm so busy on the park I don't have time to always explain the decision in full. So I'll often say, 'We'll talk at half-time' or 'After the game,' and I'll go looking for that player.

"Just because I've seen it one way doesn't mean I'm right. A player I like refereeing would be Andrew Mehrtens. I know he gets up some referees a bit, but if Andrew asks about law you know he's invariably right, so he's actually good to banter with. I find it mentally stimulating to have someone like that on the park."

Professionally, there is a line it's unwise to cross. He has not had, and would not have, a player to his home. It is necessary to remain - "and this is a bad term" - aloof.

"I haven't ever felt in a situation where I've been uncomfortable with the relationship I've got with a player ... yet."

Walsh's conversation is peppered with such qualifiers: not yet, not so far, not that I know of. It reveals a sensibility that circumstances change, as his often have.

His present injury is not the first such misfortune in his career as a respected, rising star in international refereeing circles. Last year, after surgery in November 1998 to shorten some bones in his feet, he was off for 10 months, missing his first Five Nations assignment between Ireland and England at Lansdowne Road. Now he's again watching from the couch.

At 28, Walsh, the youngest of our professional referees, is cheerfully conversational, respected for his forthright style and seemingly without guile. "Straight up" is what people say about him, and that's the quality he brings to the scene when two teams run out into one of rugby's international amphitheatres.

He admits that because of his youth he was initially considered "a bit of a show pony" by his peers, that some praise went to his head ("Definitely, but I'm a better person at 28 than 25") and early in his career he imposed too much of his personality on a game ("But I'm drawing back from that, although that's what makes you an individual, you go out there and be yourself").

Talking with Walsh in his discreetly tasteful home on Auckland's North Shore, he gives the impression that being himself is all he can be, either here or under the lights.

He has been refereeing since he was 16, three years after a spine injury and subsequent medical check revealed birth deformities in his neck. His playing career looked to be over, although he says he was going to start again at 18 regardless of what anyone said. But by then he was enjoying refereeing and the risk of life in a wheelchair wasn't what he wanted. Now he wouldn't ask for anything different.

"I've met so many good people. Every kid at 12 or 13 thinks they're going to be an All Black - and I was good, but there are many others so much better. I could've been a Joe Average club player, but I've got to see the world and travel. And it's a job now. I'm lucky."

He wasn't much interested in school (Glenfield Intermediate, Glenfield College for three years, then Kristin) and these days admits he makes a better living - "an attractive package, but not what an All Black gets" - than when he was a customs agent for a freight-forwarding company.

But the lifestyle, superficially glamorous but often boring and lonely when travelling here or internationally, isn't conducive to families or relationships. This year he's only been in his new house for three weekends since January. A colleague in Britain was away from home for more than 200 nights in each of the past two years. "He felt it cost him his marriage."

This is Walsh's third year as a highly self-critical professional. As with his colleagues, it's a rare occasion when he hasn't scrutinised one of his games on video afterwards - often with his coach, supplied by the Rugby Union. And he has been prepared to change his opinion, notably about the video-ref and microphones which allow him to communicate directly to the viewing audience at home.

Initially he had reservations about the video-ref but now suggests using it more often for incidents such as when Waratah Jason Little blatantly obstructed Highlander Romi Ropati in a sprint for the ball a week ago, which went unnoticed by referee Mark Lawrence and the touch judges.

"But we are still learning. You don't want to use it too much but sometimes it's crucial and people want us to get it right and don't care how we do that."

Also at first uncomfortable about his comments being broadcast, he now uses the microphone as a tool. Players generally know there was an infringement but he's aware his ruling - and good commentators will allow for it - is relayed live to the public. And yes, he's moderated his language, "although I sometimes think there's a front-row mentality and the only way to get through to them is to say, 'Look, you ... (whatever you want to say), let's sort it out.'"

By law, referees have to talk to front rows about scrum engagement before a match and how they're going to call it, but he believes it's important to give the players the opportunity to determine the nature of a game.

"At that stage either myself or the touch judges will look at padding and boots, then I'll ask both captains when they'd like to do the toss. The captain and coach may be standing around and may ask questions but, personally, I never go and say, 'Last week I saw you do this, don't try it.'

"If it's not played in the right spirit or under the right laws then we have to come in and take part. If they didn't infringe we wouldn't have to do anything about it."

Of referees accused of using too much whistle, he says the New Zealand philosophy is preventative rather than punitive - "I think that's the right way" - and notes that because of the citing system they cannot ignore even low-level niggle.

"Ask the players and they'd much rather the referee deal with it quickly than it lead to being cited. We need to be vigilant and it's going to help the player at the end of the day.

"I think we in New Zealand and Australia - South Africa is a fraction behind - are lucky. The attitude here is to play attractive rugby and try to give away few penalties because they cost points."

He couldn't name one player today at the top level who could be described as a thug ("There are some guys on the edge") and in that respect it is becoming easier to referee, "but the game is also getting faster, which is making it more difficult to have accuracy in decision-making."

Also, the emotional demands the sport places on referees take their toll. Walsh is vaguely entertaining the idea of engaging a sports psychologist because "sometimes it's hard to be at a peak, week in and week out. In New Zealand we have only touched the tip of it. Some teams are into it but I've been a bit of a sceptic of all that, but it may be worth investigating."

He says it is possible refereeing will be his career in the long term "but whether it's going to be is a different story. "Colin Hawke is around 45, but I'm a bigger guy and put on weight easily so I might not be able to keep up. In my early 30s I'll re-evaluate. My contract is up for renewal in two years and they may not want me," he laughs.

He acknowledges he has seen the schedule for June through to August and hasn't picked up any tests. He suspects and hopes that is more a reflection of the blooding-in of new guys than an analysis of his past tests, though he also concedes that the game needs the best refs.

"I'm not considered one of the best, although I'm aiming at it, and the best should get the games. It's a professional sport."

Professionalism has, however, made rugby a very different game in ways that Walsh, who calls himself a "traditionalist," is disappointed by. Players socialise less after a game, and with so many night games there is often little time to get together anyway. They train harder, look after their bodies better, and "instead of cracking a tinnie after a game a lot of them are filling themselves with fluids. They've got next week to worry about."

And so have referees, even if they are only human and sometimes make a wrong call.

"My belief is, obviously, we've got to get decisions right all of the time, although it just doesn't work like that. We're going to make errors and that's part of the game. And the human element is not a bad thing. After all, controversy sells newspapers."