Wayne Barnes reveals he had heart restarted midway through Rugby World Cup

Rugby World Cup final referee Wayne Barnes has revealed he had to undergo surgery during last year’s tournament to restart his heart.

In an exclusive book extract from his biography titled Wayne Barnes Throwing the Book, the retired referee says he had issues with his heart in the lead-up to the pool game between Wales and Australia in Lyon but decided to continue and take charge of the match.

“I travelled down to Lyon the following day, and my heart hadn’t stopped racing by the Sunday, when the game was taking place. So now I was in a bit of a dilemma: if I told the bosses about my issue, my tournament – and refereeing career – would be over; but if I refereed the game, I was worried that I’d be miles off the pace. I didn’t think I’d collapse, I just thought I might let the players down,” the Telegraph reports in an extract.

“My heart kept speeding up and slowing down all day, but I decided I was going to do the game. When I looked at my watch during my warm-up, it was already running at 180 bpm. I crossed my fingers and hoped it would rectify itself before kick-off. Unfortunately, it didn’t.”

Barnes writes that Wales began the game with a try which didn’t make things easy for him, leading to him telling the assistant referees at halftime about his struggles.

“It was a start I could have done without, seeing as it required me to run about 50 metres. I thought, ‘Oh s***, I’m in trouble here…’

“I limited my running as much as possible for the rest of the first half, which both teams made easier for me by giving loads of penalties away, but I knew I had to tell my fellow referees during the break.

“A camera crew was following us around for a documentary, but once they’d got a bit of footage of us talking about our first-half performance, I asked them to leave.

“Once the camera crew had made themselves scarce, I said to my fellow refs – an all-English team of Luke Pearce, Christophe and TMO Tom Foley – “Right, a bit of a problem, my heart has started racing, but it has happened before and I’m sure it will be fine.”

“A slight underplay you might say, but I didn’t want to worry them.”

Barnes was diagnosed with atrial fibrillation in 2009 leading to an ablation operation. Following the Wales’ 40-6 win over the Wallabies he had to undergo the knife again but kept it secret from his bosses. A quick trip to London to see his cardiologist Richard Schilling fixed him right.

“I woke up the following morning thinking my World Cup was probably over, which was a devastating feeling. I’d muddled through Wales-Australia, but it wouldn’t have been fair on the teams to referee another game in that kind of condition.

“While I was out for the count, Richard restarted my heart, and when I saw him again, he told me it had all gone to plan. Richard told me my left ventricle was still enlarged, that he might have to perform another ablation somewhere down the line, but that I’d be OK for the rest of the tournament.”

“I had decided not to tell the bosses what was going on because I thought they might panic, and they’d have had every right to stand me down.

“After all, if a player told their coach that they’d just had a heart operation under general anaesthetic, it’s highly unlikely they’d let them play a game a few days later,” Barnes writes.

Barnes managed to conceal his shaven chest and burn mark from the paddle used to jump-start his heart from fellow referees. A few weeks later following the All Blacks thrilling quarter-final win over Ireland he was told he would referee the final.

“On the Monday, following the epic Ireland v New Zealand quarter-final, Joel Jutge called me into his office and said, ‘Wayne, we thought you were great. Congratulations, you’re going to referee the final.’

“‘Unless England are in it,’ I replied.”

“I’d been through this scenario before at the previous World Cup. And having been told that I’d be refereeing the final if England weren’t in it, they played brilliantly to beat New Zealand in their semi-final in Yokohama. But after Handre Pollard’s winning kick in this semi-final, it was confirmed the World Cup final would be my last game.

“Despite all the big decisions we had – things could have got pretty hairy for me had we not had the bunker system doing most of the dirty work – I massively enjoyed it. It was a classic match-up in the magnificent Stade de France. It was the best possible way to bow out.”