Nigel Owens insists rugby's TMO trumps VAR but must be used less during Six Nations

The Six Nations experience might be improved if referees showed less tendency to deliberate decisions with the television match official (TMO), rugby 's answer to football's video assistant referee (VAR).

However, retired official Nigel Owens feels the TMO is a more effective system due to the way in which it's implemented, specifically in regards to how fans are made aware of why decisions are made.

On the eve of his second Six Nations tournament since retiring from a 17-year career at rugby's pinnacle, the 50-year-old believes both sports can learn from one another in order to perfect their respective crafts.

And in particular, Owens would like to see the TMO used less frequently by referees as a reference point, even if football is, as he sees it, "a far less complex game."

“TMO works better than VAR in the way that people know what’s happening,” Owens told William Hill .

“When you put a decision up in rugby, it’s explained and shown why the decision is given or changed so that everyone watching the game in the stadium or at home knows exactly why the try was disallowed because he’s knocked it forward. You may not agree but you know why the decision has been made, so it’s better in that context.

“In football, when you’re in the stadium you don’t know why the goal is disallowed. Fans can’t understand it, which is why they get frustrated because they think there’s nothing wrong with the decision, they haven’t seen it again. But if they had seen it again and the referee explained why you are offside, whether they agree with it or not, it’s offside. So, the TMO works better in that way.

“But the way it doesn’t work better is it’s used too much in rugby. Football use it much less than we do, though they can