Gold not happy with Super Rugby referee decisions

Sharks Director of Rugby Gary Gold has expressed his unhappiness at some of the decisions made by Super Rugby referee Chris Pollock.

The Sharks suffered their fifth consecutive loss when they were beaten 32-34 by the Hurricanes on Saturday and Gold feels that his team deserved more.

The Hurricanes scored two late penalties which cost the Sharks a losing bonus point but Gold was not happy with Pollock disallowing a try by Marcell Coetzee.

Gold says that the two penalties and the Coetzee try not being awarded were hammer blows but he also admits that the Sharks need to play better.

“After the poor performance against the Highlanders, I thought the guys worked hard during the week and I was impressed by the commitment of the players,” Gold told Business Day.

“We crossed the Hurricanes’ tryline four times with one of the tries being bizarrely disallowed at a critical time of the game,” Gold said.

“We saw a lot of improvement but there were certain defensive errors. We need to put our hands up and admit that was (still) not good enough. “

“I’m not only disappointed that we did not get the win and the bonus point win, I’m disappointed that we did not come away with any points at all.”

“It was a hugely disappointing evening considering the huge amount of effort the players put in.”

Gold feels that Pollock should have punished Hurricanes hooker Motu Matu’u for what he feels was a late tackle on Sharks wing Odwa Ndungane.

“That late charge on Odwa was another momentum shift. Not only wasn’t it a yellow card or a penalty, it ended up being a lineout. I’m staggered as to how are you allowed to compete with no arms in the air, let along being late. It’s important that I don’t want to be seen to be moaning about it, those calls didn’t go our way,” Gold said.

“For us to have unleashed what was a quality textbook driving maul which led to an emphatic try to not even be properly referred to the TMO to make the decision from what he saw from the screen was disappointing. “

“We are not really in the position to complain about referees but that was a huge momentum shift.”

The Sharks have not yet determined the full extent of the injuries from the match but there is concern for Bismarck du Plessis after he came off in the 55th minute with what Gold suspects is a leg injury.