The All Blacks’ Ian Foster insisted that the decision was “crystal cut,” despite Australia coach Dave Rennie’s claim that he had never seen a call like the one French referee Mathieu Raynal made that cost his team the victory over New Zealand.
On Thursday in Melbourne, the Wallabies were seconds away from pulling off a remarkable comeback victory when Bernard Foley was called for a penalty. The score was 37-34 at the time.
In the last seconds of the game, Raynal overturned a penalty given to the Australians for time-wasting after Foley, playing in his first match in three years, hesitated to kick because he thought the clock was stopped.
Rennie incredulous after controversial call costs Wallabies victory
But with only 60 seconds left, the All Blacks were given a scrum five metres away, and Jordie Barrett crossed the goal line.
With one game left in Auckland the following week, they are four points behind the All Blacks.
Veteran Foley, according to Rennie, was “shocked” by the choice.
He feels he let people down despite his stellar performance. He described himself as “gutted” and said he would ask the match authorities for clarification on the contentious ruling.
Rennie remarked, “At any level, I’ve never seen a call like that. “Let the teams decide the result; (there was) just a serious lack of appropriateness for the situation.”
“From our perspective, the unfortunate thing is that it was a beautiful game of football and we should be celebrating the game, instead of arguing about a referee’s judgement in the dying seconds,”
It ended with a thrilling game.
