Men in black in the dock.

[Ducksworthy]

The other thing which rugby referees do is invariably refer to sides by their colours "blue put in"  "white free kick" and so forth.   However there are rugby referees who do play the big mates game albeit collectively by addressing players as "you guys" and "sorry fellas".   Barnes is particularly precious.

The ref who yellow-carded an England played on Saturday sent him from the pitch with words along the lines of "Sorry James, off you go"

It was the first rugby I've watched in years, so have no idea if that's indicative of it as a whole though.

Nigel Owens was on 5 Live last night talking about video technology / refs microphones and how they could be used in football. I thought he was excellent - spoke with common sense and intelligence (much more than Claridge, Savage et al) and very pointedly said that rugby has no basis whatsoever to take the moral high ground v football (rugby has more natural breaks in play so video technology is easier to implement, rugby is more complex than football so microphones important in explaining decisions to the crowd etc ...). The former footballers were very much against mikes, which I found strange.

I did hear him refer to Chris Robshaw by name on Saturday though - "go away Christopher" which was far funnier than it sounds.

if we can lip read pretty much what half a dozen Man U players surrounding a ref and bellowing into his ear about the injustice of an incorrectly awarded throw in I think miked up refs might not be such a good idea.  Or, might be an excellent idea. 

remember when David Elleray was mic'd up for a first division game ( Millwall v Arsenal - I think) without the players' knowledge. I hate the big-headed former Harrow schoolmaster but he was getting dogs' abuse from the players. Adams was shouting " you fackin cheat" at him at one point. So bad it was quite funny

Just found it out - made me laugh how he speaks to them as if they've just been caught skipping lessons or something..

[Boz]

It's not only the UK that referees are crap. The one in El Clasico was also terrible with what he let Real particularly get away with.