A lesson to all refs - be wary of retiring players with growing Youtube channels who can say what they want post retirement.
Probably shouldn't though.
Dan Cole is going to regret those words about "If I meant to cheap shot him, I should cheap shot him, get red carded, and hopefully get him off the field".
I have great sympathy for them, this was recorded less than 24 hours after their retirement, and such a huge, close loss.
Pretty sure the loser of every side feels aggrieved after any match for a good 24-48 hours before letting it go.
Which IMO means that they simply should have postponed the show by a day or two.
I'm absolutely sure that Cole didn't go up with the intention of receiving a yellow card - I'm sure he went in with the intention of charging down a kick - something he's quite possibly never done before; and he screwed up - he got his body position wrong, and his angle of jump wrong, then he compounded it by leading with his elbow - as shown in their own youtube video.
Sometimes, you screw up - and it hurts, but after a little time to reflect, you put your hands up and say "yeah, I shouldn't have done that" or "I should have done it differently" - he hadn't really had that time to reflect at the time of recording.
As for Youngs and his box-kick - he can give all the rationale he likes; and quote as many other SHs who do the same as he likes - if you're behind in the last minute of a match, you are always going to cop flak if you just give the ball away to your opponents.
In the context of the match, it was a classic example of not learning. You comment on how good Muir had been in the air all day; then you drop the ball on top of him with no real chasers. You comment on how Bath had only given away 2 penalties all day, both at scrum time; and your gambit is that, with 50 seconds to go, you'll get a kickable penalty? That's never the right decision - however much programming you've had to box-kick from a ruck in your own half, 5m from the sideline.
ETA: At some point, I'm going to re-watch the match, and try to put my bias aside, and Healey's bias aside; and see if I do think that either side got the general benefit of the ref.
At the time, it felt like Leicester got the benefit of the card decisions*; Bath were robbed of 1 try**; Dickson let a lot go from both sides; and that Bath got the benefit in terms of kickable penalties. It also felt that Bath had more attacking momentum than Leicester, and spent a lot more time playing in Leicester's half - that team tends to get the benefit from "rub of the green" decisions.
* I'm just about okay with yellow, but Montoya could very easily have seen ref - especially as, whilst dynamic, the ball carrier's head didn't dip at all (if anything, it bumps up)
** Even if we accept that Nicky Smith doesn't know what a rugby ball feels like when his hand touches one - it's still back off white, not a knock-on; so the ball is live, and Ewels (?) dotting the ball down is a try (assuming he didn't manage to drop it - I don't recall seeing any replays of that bit). I will also say that it took me until after the match to notice that miss.
** I know a lot of Bath fans are saying that Muir didn't knock the ball forwards, but I disagree - I can't really tell for the initial sideways movement, but he loses control on the ground, and the ball pops up at his shoulder, closer to the Tigers' try line - I think knock-on is accurate; even if Dickson was letting a lot of stuff go.
