Henry suspected match fixing after RWC 07 exit
29 Jul 2012
Graham Henry believes the All Blacks were victims of match fixing during the 20-18 quarter-final loss to France in the 2007 World Cup.
In his biography, ‘Graham Henry Final Word’, Henry revealed that he contemplated match-fixing as the only logical explanation for the All Blacks’ upset 20-18 loss to Les Bleus.
Henry analysed the game on video for his report to the NZRU and found Barnes had awarded only two penalties to New Zealand during the game. His analysis was that France deserved to be penalised up to 40 times.
His gut feeling, according to his biography, was that the video ‘would confirm that referee Wayne Barnes and his touch judges, Jonathan Kaplan from South Africa and Tony Spreadbury from England, hadn’t exactly covered themselves in glory at the Millennium Stadium, that they had missed an obvious forward pass when France scored its match-winning try – a pass so forward everyone in the stadium had witnessed it except the referee – and that Barnes had been pretty lenient on the French at the breakdowns, probably costing the All Blacks the game’.
Henry’s video had three different angles and featured statistical breakdowns of lineouts, scrums, penalties, tackle counts, territory and possession. On those statistics, the All Blacks dominated. They had an overwhelming 73% territorial advantage, winning 166 rucks to France’s 42 and making only 73 tackles compared with France’s 331.
A mind-boggled Henry was so stunned by his findings, he told the NZRU it should pressure the IRB to institute an inquiry. He also said it was ‘incomprehensible’ that the IRB did not have strategies in place to investigate bizarre matches.
The NZRU chose not to push for an investigation.
188 Comments
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29 Jul 2012, 21:25 pm
@Guns-49:
do you mean like the last kickable penalty of the Final, awarded and missed, that would won France the RWC ?
Amazing how quickly Sth Africans buy in to any and every conspiracy theory going, but only when it excuses their own teams ineptitude, but then laugh off the only irregularties that are actually based on fact (1995 poisoning, 2007 no-penalties QterF) because they serve the opposition.
Its almost as lame as always referring to negative opiinions held by
@>^..^< katman-6:
“the general consensus world wide” as if everyone was as bitter and twisted and conspiracy obsessed as Sth Africans and shared their innate inability to simply acknowledge the opposition as better.
Couldnt score ONE try in 80mins vs Aus and yet the Safas would have us believe that “the general consensus world wide” was that they were robbed. Actually the general consensus, World wide in places like Wales & Samoa, is that SA were lucky to escape their pool and were bundled out in 8th place and not before time.
29 Jul 2012, 21:52 pm
@J.B. Cowper-35: You don’t know yet what Henry wrote about the 2011 final. If his book is consistent with his comments after the game, he’ll probably acknowledge that NZ should have lost in 2011 but should have won vs France in 2007. That’s sport.
His comments in the press release seem to be past tense – his initial reaction was match fixing. I’m sure he’s moved on by now but needs to put it all out there in his book. Not sure about you lot but I’ll be reading it – I quite enjoyed Woodward’s and White’s books and can’t wait for Henry’s
29 Jul 2012, 22:43 pm
Henry loses any dignity he once had with these claims especially in light of how his team ‘won’ last year’s final, doesn’t he realise most outside NZ say the same thing about that game? he would have been better advised to keep his counsel, but the bitter old boot can’t help himself.
29 Jul 2012, 22:56 pm
haha, whattajoke.
the kiwis scored off a forward pass vs france in 2007 and act all p i s s ed that france did the same like its only a nz privelege?
its quite silly but when its all you got i guess you use it.
29 Jul 2012, 23:47 pm
@AiDoc-39:
Good post. Some of these dipsticks wont get it.
@kyer-50:
Oh here is one of those dipsticks.
@Big Hit-53:
Shhh your team, drinks,take drugs, swap balls illegally and field 16 players at RWCs. You have no say.
29 Jul 2012, 23:49 pm
@rangerman-54:
Again you seem to have forgotten that France infringed most of the game and didnt get penalised or one free kick against them. The same reasons you guys are crying about over 2011. So pull ya old wrinkle face out ya a$$ and read what is exactly said here
30 Jul 2012, 01:24 am
@Big Hit-53: “but the bitter old boot can’t help himself”
That just seems a bit Pot & Kettle
30 Jul 2012, 02:43 am
@AiDoc-39:
Poorly disguised anti-Semitism, just itching to call Jonathan Kaplan a ‘Jew’, weren’t you, AiDoc? Please take your rubbish and racism elsewhere, you sad little individual.
@gonzo-52:
I guess the jury is out on Henry and his ‘consistency’, we’ll just have to wait and see, but I’d be amazed if he commented on the poor refereeing that gifted NZ the Eden Park final in 2011.
30 Jul 2012, 03:11 am
Would be interesting to hear what Henry has actually said. If all he has said is that he considered at that time that match fixing might be a possibility, then you couldn’t blame him given that the statistics (the things you can’t argue with) make that game almost unique in modern international rugby history. If that was a cricket match the international board would have had people studying every ball afterwards to look for evidence of match fixing. I don’t think it is that crazy for Henry to have reviewed the match in detail and question what happened. It might be more crazy for us all to assume that match fixing could never happen in rugby.
Given the way Henry normally handles himself in the public arena, it is quite possible that the media spin is not truly representing what he has recently said, or at least putting the most controversial spin on it that they can.
30 Jul 2012, 03:20 am
I love threads like this, it gets all the neanderthals frothing and fuming about the injustice of the fact their team was NOT good enough to advance past the 1/4 finals, so it must have been a conspiracy.
hilarious… the poor wittle Saffas, no one likes them
guess if your backs cant pass and catch the rugby ball with the tryline open, then you dont deserve to win…
but you can always blame cheating, coulrophobia (doot dooot doodle oodle doot doot do), travel disadvantage, POB, Sir Bryce, Global warming, crowd attendances, the price of oil, terrorists, Jihad, crusades, the invention of aeronautics, the cold weather, anything really, except the fact your talent isnt all that, and you dont have a thinking man behind your team..
all is good in the land of the Gold Yellow Cup AND an almost 80% all time win record…
30 Jul 2012, 04:30 am
@SA rugby is k@k-60:
hahahahahaha…………..did you just read what your “sir” Ted….(Now theres a faaking joke….why do kiwi’s want to knight everyone when they dislike things English ?) … just complained about???
Faaaak me, conspiracy, biased ref’s, so-called fwd passes, food poisoning, crime, alcohol, saffa chicks, jeez the list goes on with your whinging.
Prime doos’s
30 Jul 2012, 04:31 am
oh yeah, have you check out how the world loves you c ock suckers?
30 Jul 2012, 04:51 am
@whatever-62:
Strange, we still have so many South Africans coming over, like yourself.
Oh and dont for one minute think you guys are the most loved in the world.
30 Jul 2012, 05:08 am
Anyway this is a biography.
This is what they suppose to be like, its what Henry thought and went through.
I would feel ripped off if i bought his book only to find out the RWC 2007 part was skipped in his book or lied about. Its what he felt and it was a major part in his life, so Henry has bought it up in his book, which he is entitled to do.
One thing he did was approach NZRU about was the fact that refs can call a bad game against a team and not get looked at. He asked NZRU to go to IRB and ask the questions and give facts that refs should be judged on games etc. NZRU did pi$$ all with it really. Now if they did do something, maybe Bryce would not have called such a **** game but then you would have probably lost the British and Irish lions games as Bryce did you guys a huge favour in those tests.
Point is refs should be judged. Refs should be warned to pick their game up or lose out on the big internationals.
Refs need to be held accountable for shocking calls.
30 Jul 2012, 05:13 am
@whatever-61:
So you guys dont complain about crime, Bias refs, cheating, conspiracies, Kiwi girls, Australia, The English, The weather, Other countries stadiums, Peoples Biographies , Kiwi player leaving for money or different career……. you think you have a list, i only just pulled this list from the last 3 days blogging here.
30 Jul 2012, 05:58 am
@Hurricane-64:
“Refs need to be held accountable for shocking calls.”
Too right, Hurricane, but I don’t recall a flurry of NZ complaints when kak calls went against the French in WC Final 2011 and basically cost them victory.
Which suggests you lot are no better than any other ref whinging nation, whinge when calls go against you and your team, offer deafening silence when you and your team is the beneficiary.
So, why don’t you step down from your holier than thou pedestal as your hypocrisy slip is showing?
30 Jul 2012, 06:36 am
@Joe Maher-66:
Joe you are way of course here with your allegations against me.
Nowhere did i mention that we have NEVER complained about refs.
But you do have a point about complaints against a ref from a winning team.
Yet your post suggests we are the only one that dont complain when we win,. even after the ref somewhat giving us the rub of the green.
But we can go on forever here but as i recall no one complained about Bryce when he botched up the reffing against the British and irish lions,actually in the boks favour. How about the TMO calling on a call that TMOs are not allowed to, that was fair according to you guys.
You should have seen 2007 RWC on here after the ABs lost. Barnes had a cracker of a game according to the Bok fans.
So Joe, practice what you preach with the pedestal mate
30 Jul 2012, 06:55 am
@Hurricane-67:
If you’d care to read my post before getting all defensive, I did not suggest Bok fans were any better. I said “…which suggests you lot are no better than any other ref whinging nation, whinge when calls go against you and your team, offer deafening silence when you and your team is the beneficiary.”
Those ‘other nations’ include ALL nations. South Africa, too.
Sorry. I was probably wrong to have a go at you, my emotions fired up by your compatriot AiDoc’s anti-Semitic bullshite directed at Jonathan Kaplan. Kaplan’s religion has nothing to do with his reffing, unless your mate AiDoc is suggesting – as I supect he is – that Jewish people are conniving cheats.
If you know him personally, tell him he’s a prize tool, living in the dark ages of Shakespeare’s Merchant of Venice. Tell him, too, that his dim-witted anti-Semitic and racist comments are best kept to himself and his fellow rednecks.
30 Jul 2012, 07:06 am
How precious are all the Kwee’s now! This is hilarious; a wind up even. The bitter old clown can’t keep his gob shut after having all sorts of games handed to him by that poisonous weasel PoB. Even scuttling to his hotel to apologise about poor reffing of the AB’s in a game they won! How precious is that? He should just shut up and get on with playing the game – oops that is how NZ plays it – refs on side and all.
30 Jul 2012, 07:18 am
@AiDoc-39:
You sound like you have issues with Jews my little kiwi bigot?
Your boy should keep very quiet about match fixing and redding comspiracies.
It’s the only reason you have a world cup right now.
If the IRB had any balls POB and his chums would be answereng some very unpleasant questions right now.
Schtum.
30 Jul 2012, 07:54 am
what is anti semitic?
what do you call people who dislike italians ot porras?
no need for the jews to get special terms
they are humans just like the rest of the people
30 Jul 2012, 07:56 am
This story from Graham Henry sounds very plausible as the same thing happened in 2011.
Match fixing could be a genuine problem in rugby World Cups, it happens in cricket why not rugby.
Both games (NZ vs France ’07 and SA vs. Aus. ’11) the best team lost because the ref had more influence on the game then what should be the case.
30 Jul 2012, 08:05 am
@Hurricane-67: It is only your sick mind that would insist on a try given to you when that pass was 1 meter forward and everyone saw it . Is Sean Fitzpstrick your dad?
30 Jul 2012, 08:58 am
@BreakdownBoy-72: Comment of the year.
Well said.
30 Jul 2012, 09:06 am
Watched an interview with Henry about the comments in his biography.
After the loss his analysis pointed toward something rather odd and went to the NZRU and even sounded out some IRB officials over whether there was any mechanism to review the game, like there is in Cricket.
The answer he got was no, and he was urged to let it go.
This he did, and he is thankful he did so, because he accepts if he had bitched to the media like Laurie Mains did, he would not have been re-appointed AB’s coach.
This is his biography, surely the vehicle to express his honest opinions, or should he make up new opinions based on what is politically correct.
30 Jul 2012, 09:15 am
@BreakdownBoy-72: SA /Aus there was no match fixing – how many times did SA drop the ball over the line – they just could not finish ( simple )
30 Jul 2012, 09:29 am
@stew-76:
Danie Rossouw cost SA the lead in that match through a reckless lineout infringement.
Had Semo fallen badly after having his legs taken out from under him jumping for the ball, Rossouw would have been marched.
The penlty was kicked and Aus managed to hang through to the end.
30 Jul 2012, 09:45 am
seems henry and PDV have more in common than I thought…. I have immense respect for what he has achieved, but I do not believe there was any considered effort to deny the ABs, and I do not believe bryce lawrence intended to influence the outcome of the SA Aus match either.
Henry’s admittance is actually a blight on him i think, Just as PDV should just shut up and forget about it too.
30 Jul 2012, 09:46 am
@Brads-77: Our general inability to finish with so much possession cost us the game. That doesn’t mean it wasn’t also the most flagrantly awful reffing I’ve ever seen.
I wonder why Henry doesn’t question the multitude of instances where the AB’s have benefited from their own forward passes being missed?
30 Jul 2012, 09:50 am
@Brads-77: Nah we lost it because of not being able to put the Aussies away with that amount of possession we should have buried them. Cant lay the blame at Danie’s door even though what he did was stupid.
30 Jul 2012, 09:53 am
So which was it?
A His analysis?
B Or his “gut feeling”?
C Or is he full of s.hit?
I’ll take C please Bob.
30 Jul 2012, 09:57 am
@Atreides-79:
NZ have lost before and won as well due to marginal or outright misses by the ref and his assistants.
However, what got Henry’s goat is summed up by the observation of French rugby journalist Ian Borthwick. “Sports journalist, Ian Borthwick says it was extremely bizarre how suddenly France became the most disciplined team in the history of international rugby.”
30 Jul 2012, 10:00 am
@the artist formerly known as gunther-81:
I am not saying he is right, I am saying he is expressing his memories of what went through his mind at the time.
30 Jul 2012, 10:02 am
@stew-76: true. in all instances one can argue, the players could still bring it back from wherever. Breakdown Boy is making the point – what the point is being made about. apart from the rest of the issues. we need to big brother the refs. watch them day and night and report all of them if they’re wearing leather jackets.
30 Jul 2012, 10:03 am
@Brads-82:
French Journalist?
you fibbing tosser.
He’s a kiwi who writes for a French newspaper (L’Equipe).
What a lag.
30 Jul 2012, 10:04 am
@Joe Maher-68:
All Good Joe.
Your points are spot on really. Refs need to be better.
Better ref, better game.
@the artist formerly known as gunther-81:
There is a D.
D : we dont care what you think.
30 Jul 2012, 10:04 am
last i checked rugby is still considered a sport…
these things happen…
sometimes teams play above themselves and sometimes teams have the perfect game…
any time south africans have complained about reffing… and shown video evidence of bad calls, we’ve been labeled whingers and told to suck it up…
oh the irony…
all this proves to me is the arrogant sense of entitlement that graham henry possesses…
30 Jul 2012, 10:04 am
@Brads-82: Don’t get me wrong, Barnes performance was woeful! But it happens to ALL teams eventually.
A lot of posters here are quite comfortable holding 2 opposing viewpoints simultaneously ie: when it happens to their teams, there’s fury and outrage and heads must roll, but when it happens to the opposition, suddenly ‘that’s just how it goes’, ‘stop whining’ and ‘suck it up’ etc…
30 Jul 2012, 10:06 am
@Skeppie-80:
I agree with your view, however I like to throw that snippet in when ever I read comments that Lawrence was the entire reason for SA losing.
Just like RWC07. New Zealand failed because we lost our mojo. The AB’s of 2006 would have destroyed France.
30 Jul 2012, 10:07 am
south africa will be trialling the extended use of the TMO in our currie cup this year…
hopefully this will be the beginning of the end of the wrong calls being made…
30 Jul 2012, 10:08 am
@Hurricane-86: Hurricane, top of the morning. What do you make of all this?
30 Jul 2012, 10:09 am
@Brads-89: I agree 100%, I suppose when you are playing such a vital game sometimes that killer instinct to attack get’s supressed and you end up letting a team that has no posession and has had to make 5X the tackles in.
30 Jul 2012, 10:10 am
Let’s not forget that SA were well used to losing to Aus by the time they got to the tournament. I seem to remember that it was their 4th consecutive loss to the Aussies, so it was hardly a result that no one expected.
30 Jul 2012, 10:10 am
@Brads-83:
No buddy.
First he talks about “careful analysis” then he talks about “gut feeling”.
Which is it?
Because they are very different things.
he felt he had enough to institute an enquiry, he talks about opne collusion between ALL THE MATCH OFFICIALS.
This goes much further than anything Divvie moaned about.
He should share the fruits of his analysis.
Or go down in history as a cracker.
30 Jul 2012, 10:14 am
@aliboy-93: What bearing does gthat have on anything? All that matters was the game itself, are you saying that because they beat our C team in the Tri Nations prior to the WC they deserved to beat us in the QF?
30 Jul 2012, 10:16 am
@Skeppie-91:
Well Skeppie its done and dusted in my opinion. People on here need to realise that this is what GH went through at that stage of his life,it called Biography.
But refs need to be sorted out as well.
Not because of NZ and France or SA and OZ games. There have been alot of others that just not good enough.
Its scary mate cos the game you loved for so long and followed comes crashing down with reports of match fixing.
We all know refs are human and make mistakes but too many mistakes that benefits one side needs to be reviewed and if found out to be suspect…..ban ref for 3 months or some sort of punishment.
Lets fix this game of ours and actually fix the rules to help refs as well.
30 Jul 2012, 10:28 am
@the artist formerly known as gunther-94:
What are you on about? I never compared Henry to PdV.
You are making up scenarios.
He did the analysis, as he and every half decent coach does after a game and based on those stats, his gut feeling was the only explanation was match fixing.
That said, there was next to no way of proving that at the time, and even less now.
So as I said in an earlier post, these are his memories of how he felt following the loss to France. Surely honesty is what you should expect from an authorised biography, not some pale sanitised version of what is politically correct.
I doubt very much that he has stated anywhere in the book he still firmly holds the view that Barnes, Kaplan and co are corrupt.
30 Jul 2012, 10:33 am
@Brads-97:
“I doubt very much that he has stated anywhere in the book he still firmly holds the view that Barnes, Kaplan and co are corrupt.”
well what exactly is he saying by opining that he suspects matchfixing and going on to say barnes should have pinged the french 40 times…?
i reckon barnes should lawyer up…
30 Jul 2012, 10:35 am
@Brads-97:
no.
analysis and gut feeling don’t go together at all.
if he did all this analysis where is it?
surely this is the time to share?
tell me more about this frenchman Ian Borthwick?
@Hurricane-86:
you obviously do care or you wouldn’t waste your time telling me you don’t
30 Jul 2012, 10:35 am
@Hurricane-96: That’s my worry….I can accept that rugby will always have that human reffing element and at one time or another everyones team is going to get the rough end of the stick but GH’s comments paint a scary picture. I never noticed that Barnes was that rough on the kiwi’s, to me it was only really the forward pass but I guess it went quite a bit deeper than that. I would love to know his thoughts on our QF with the Aussies.
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