Wynne Gray: Update refs' powers to avert fiasco at Cup time

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Imagine the scene. This may be hard for you. World Cup final, All Blacks playing the Wallabies and with a slim lead late in the match.

Daniel Carter miscues a clearing kick but sends the ball into the crowd. Wallaby hooker Tatafu Polota-Nau grabs a different ball for a quick throw-in and sends halfback Will Genia racing 40m for a try and the Webb Ellis Cup.

The ref, let's say Wayne Barnes, is suspicious and quizzes his touchie about the legality of the lineout. The touchie is certain the ball Carter kicked out was used for the quick throw and had not been touched by anyone else.

Barnes has no option and despite protests from All Black captain Richie McCaw and howls from the crowd, awards the try.

The Wallabies cart the trophy for world rugby supremacy back home for the third time while New Zealand sets up a Royal Commission of Inquiry into the fiasco.

Say it ain't so, say it can't happen. Take a look at Wales beating Ireland in the last round of the Six Nations series and watch it all unfold.

Referee Jonathan Kaplan quizzes his touch judge Peter Allan about the ball, the lineout and is assured it is all kosher. Kaplan had no alternative under the current rules, there was no provision to ask other officials or to view a video replay. The try stood.

What a joke, just like quick lineouts. Ban them, they are as logical as paper mouthguards.

It makes no sense when a side peels off a large amount of territory with a legitimate kick, that it is then punished by their opponents biffing the ball in quickly. It denies sides an alternate tactical approach, it panders to those who want the game sped up at every opportunity.

Why should teams be punished for wanting lineouts. If rugby wants to pursue the old line that it is a game for all shapes and sizes then why undermine those giraffes whose physiques suit jumping in lineouts.

The most fascinating matches are those where teams of disparate styles battle throughout to impose their methods, where we get thrust and counter-thrust, kick versus run, rumble against rollicking play.

Next we will have the Wallabies using three-man scrums and the inevitable crooked scrum feed on the engage command to bypass their setpiece frailty.

Back to the men with the whistle. Give them amended powers to check on crucial pieces of evidence in a try-scoring move. Let them check with the TMO, otherwise they, like cricket umpires denied a review of their rulings, are made to look clueless in front of huge audiences.

The IRB balks at such ideas but referees boss Paddy O'Brien only needs recall his patchy work in the 1999 World Cup when replays revealed he made several crucial errors which, if corrected, would have given Fiji the win they deserved instead of France.