Should refs be multilingual?

[Tooting Carmen]

There are countries that play rugby which are not English-speaking - most prominently (among others) France, Italy, Georgia, Japan and Argentina - and it is high time that the referees took this into account.

 

[Bruce_ma gooshvili]

I would say no. English is so prevalent and they struggle to get enough decent refs as it is without finding linguists (or fluent in two languages at least). However when there are professional referees that can speak Spanish and you have Argentina vs Chile reffed by someone who cannot speak a word of Spanish, then you are doing something wrong.

 

[Saintjay]

There are countries that play rugby which are not English-speaking - most prominently (among others) France, Italy, Georgia, Japan and Argentina - and it is high time that the referees took this into account.

So a good ref has to learn how many languages?

 

[Tooting Carmen]

So a good ref has to learn how many languages?

They should specialise - some learn Spanish, others Italian, others French, others Japanese, maybe others Georgian and/or Romanian, and a few may have a combination of more than one.

 

[Tooting Carmen]

However when there are professional referees that can speak Spanish and you have Argentina vs Chile reffed by someone who cannot speak a word of Spanish, then you are doing something wrong.

Well exactly.

 

[OldSchoolRugga]

There should be at least 1 English speaking player in each team, for the refs to communicate with, if the captain does not already speak English. To the original question, I say No.

 

[Tooting Carmen]

In rugby we love to talk about "respect". Well, how about officials actually respect and acknowledge the languages the players speak? (Maybe getting refs to learn Georgian would be a stretch, but at the very least genuinely global languages like French and Spanish).

 

[Brigantine]

How does it work in domestic club rugby in multilingual countries?

How many languages does the typical club rugby referee speak in South Africa or Hong Kong or Belgium?

I remember a video from 2022 of the Saudi (soccer) coach giving his team a half time speech... via a translator.
You would think that international tournaments were well enough resourced to solve any language problems, either by selecting the right referees, or by having a translator on the pitch, or through tech.