Cowards who hide on the internet

It would be inaccurate to say that the Pau coach Sebastien Piqueronies' manhandling of the Scottish referee Sam Grove-White last weekend was miles out of order. In rugby terms, it was light years beyond the pale – and your columnist writes this as one who, in his long-lost playing days, was sent off and banned for brushing shoulders with an official after a roughhouse match in the West Country.

But whatever the gravity of Piqueronies' action, it was a long way short of the toxic bile aimed at poor Wayne Barnes by the super-courageous online warriors whose chosen method of supporting the Springboks is to contaminate cyberspace with insults, threats and similar delights.

Barnes is a refereeing great – Blind Pew himself could have seen that much – and he presided over a France-South Africa contest in Marseille that was so transfixing in its intensity, it was far more than the best match of the Autumn international series. It was among the best of the best in recent memory.

His reward? Threats to his wife, Polly, and his children. “That takes it to a different level,” he reflected this week. “When you've done a hundred internationals, you think you can prepare for most things. You can't prepare for that.”

Rassie Erasmus, the Springbok boss whose enthusiastic online criticisms of match officials have become such a feature of life at Test level, might care to ponder this before he next opens his laptop or reaches for his smartphone. There again, he might not.

Erasmus is only a part of the problem, however. The far bigger part is internet anonymity and the pond life hiding behind it. “Come here and say that,” would be the optimum response to these people. Sadly, we don't know who they are.