World Cup banking on bunkers to avoid controversial red cards

MARSEILLE, France: Despite the Owen Farrell farce during a less-than-auspicious trial, the TMO "bunker review system" will be in place at the Rugby World Cup in France in a bid to avoid controversial red cards potentially ruining matches in the sport's shop window.

The system means that if a referee considers an offence not to be a "clear and obvious" sending off, he can show a yellow card and, while the player is serving his 10 minutes in the sin-bin, a TMO reviews the offence and has the option of upgrading the yellow to a red.

The thinking behind the system is twofold. Firstly, World Rugby wants to avoid a repeat of contentious decisions where players have been sent off for marginal offences that, on review via many TV angles, have appeared to be not worthy of the ultimate sanction.

Secondly, they want to save time, so instead of a referee standing on the pitch going back and forth through his microphone asking for myriad replays, those discussions take place in the "bunker" as the game continues.

The concept, also trialled in other competitions around the world this year, has been broadly welcomed by players, coaches and fans, but the Farrell debacle last month showed that it is still an issue subject to opinion and error.

Farrell was sin-binned for shoulder-to-head contact with Wales's Taine Basham and, as expected, his yellow was upgraded to red as he sat on the touchline.

When he went for his independent disciplinary hearing there was widespread incredulity when the panel found that, rather than earning a long ban, the England captain should not have been sent off at all, because of a late change of direction by Basham.

World Rugby appealed and another independent committee ruled that the previous one had been wrong, and