KEY POINTS:
Contrary to popular belief, things could be worse for the England head coach, Andy Robinson, who saw his team disappear down the tubes in record fashion against the All Blacks at Twickenham yesterday morning.
According to one major bookmaker, the chances of David Beckham playing his football in Los Angeles next season are almost three times better than those of Robinson receiving the P45 treatment ahead of the 2007 World Cup, which begins in France in 10 months' time.
And as we all know to our cost, you rarely see a bookie riding a bike.
However, Robinson is now officially an unlucky coach.
Even the governing body of the union game, the International Rugby Board, says so.
Yesterday, the IRB's referee manager, the New Zealander Paddy O'Brien, openly conceded that the two French officials at the centre of the most controversial moment in last weekend's fixture, Joel Jutge and Christophe Berdos, had been wrong to deny the England centre Jamie Noon an opening try that just might have cramped the All Blacks' style.
"I'm not going to stand here and defend the indefensible," O'Brien said.
"When Joel referred the incident to the television match official [Berdos], the wrong questions were asked. I have no doubt the try was legitimate.
"Had I been refereeing the game without the option of going 'upstairs', my instinct would unquestionably have been to award the score." This will be of little consolation to the beleaguered Robinson, apart from to confirm him in his suspicion that the sporting gods are having their wicked way with him.
In 2005, he landed himself in a sea of boiling water with the IRB by criticising the South African referee Jonathan Kaplan, whose performance in the Six Nations game between Ireland and England in Dublin did not amuse the red rose coach one little bit.
Earlier this year, when England finished second to the Irish once again, Robinson was equally exasperated by the decision of the Welsh referee Nigel Whitehouse to award Shane Horgan a profoundly dubious five-pointer at an important moment.
Interestingly, the IRB is planning to extend the influence of the television match official by allowing the match referee to refer incidents in the build-up to a try.
At the moment, he can only ask a question - sometimes the right one, sometimes the wrong one - in respect of the act of scoring.
If the evidence of yesterday's pantomime is anything to go by, the television match official should be asking the man on the field for advice.
Or better still, he might switch off his television set and push off home.
- INDEPENDENT
