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For someone from the rugby fraternity to get on a high horse and moralise about Luis Suarez biting an opponent is fraught with danger.

Inevitably there will be those in the football world whose response will be: “Take a look at your own sport before pointing the finger”.

Sure, rugby has many more instances of the offence in its history books than football and I don’t believe biting is any more acceptable on a rugby field than a football one. It’s appalling, totally inexcusable.

Yet maybe the one difference you could highlight is that, in rugby, in which physical contact is far more than football, there are times, say during a maul, when an opponent’s hand touches a face or a mouth and the natural instinct is to bite as a defence mechanism, as a means of getting the hand away.

But the way Suarez allegedly bit Italian defender Giorgio Chiellini looked a little like the way a dog would go after a bone. And if my dog had done that he would be put down.

There have been calls for a two-year ban to be given to the Liverpool striker if he is found guilty of the offence, for what would be the third time in his career.

I wouldn’t disagree with that. Fine him by all means and make sure the money goes to a deserving cause, but a fine in itself is no deterrent, and it doesn’t send a powerful enough message to either the player or the millions of kids who will be influenced by his actions.

Perhaps football could learn a thing or two about how rugby deals with an offence of foul play like this.

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Rugby, at present, even though it is a game that has more natural stoppages than football, is over-using technology.

It has a part to play in try-line decisions and with acts of serious foul play, but on things like forward passes and infringements at rucks it has become too much, it isn’t good for the game and referees should be making more of these decisions themselves – and getting them right.

Football – a game that is less open to rules interpretation than rugby – I think has it about right, with technology used just to determine whether the ball has crossed the line.

But if the Suarez incident had happened on the rugby pitch, the Italian captain could have asked the referee to study the footage and the Uruguayan could have been sent off, immediately placing his team at a disadvantage and preventing him from affecting the game further.

Yet even that situation wouldn’t be ideal.

In rugby, captains asking referees to look at video during a game to get to the bottom of alleged foul play is something that isn’t covered formally in the rules, it has just crept in because it has always been allowed.

It’s happening too much now though, and refs are in an impossible position.

If a player says, for example, that his eyes have been gouged at a ruck, even if you have not seen it, the onus is on you to check because if it has happened and you wave it away, you leave yourself open to all sorts.

However, it could take several minutes to unearth the offence, if it ever existed at all, and so it becomes a thankless process for everyone, not least the spectators.

My solution in both rugby and football would be to allow players to ask officials to study footage once during a game. If the grievance is proved to be genuine then they can ask again, if not, then the avenue is closed to them for the rest of the match. That would prevent players persistently trying it on which would inevitably lead to too much disruption. It would also take the pressure off a referee to keep checking for fear of being pilloried for refusing.

Having watched this World Cup, I think football would benefit from a couple of other things rugby does in terms of officiating.

Firstly, the referees should wear microphones so we can all hear exactly what is being said.

Secondly, moving a free-kick forward 10 metres for dissent would also work well. If that means a move into the penalty box then a free-kick should become a penalty. Radical? Sure. But watch players pipe down at that prospect.

The Uruguay v Italy game depressed me for one other thing as well, and that was the way the Italian players, including their goalkeeper, harangued the referee for sending off Claudio Marchisio, a decision by the way which was 100% correct.

That IS a major difference from rugby. I simply never encounter anything like that.

I’ve outlined this before; my concern is the effect it has on youngsters.

I went to watch one of my cousins playing a rugby match not so long ago, he simply got his head down and got on with the game. A week or so later I watched him play football and he was shouting at the referee and moaning about this, that and the other. Afterwards, when I asked him why he’d been a different character compared to the rugby, he simply said it was because in football he was able to get away with it. What can you say to that?

So, England’s interest in the tournament has ended and I’ll leave it to the experts to dissect where they went wrong, although for the life of me I don’t know why they weren’t more cavalier against Costa Rica when they had nothing to lose.

All I would say is that I’m sorry to see them depart because as a British side I wanted them to do well, it would have kept the interest bubbling as the World Cup went on.

I know there are the usual Welsh fans revelling in England’s demise, but I’ve never really gone in for that. Hating England and wanting them to lose is all a stage too far for me.

I have mates who follow Swansea City and are also fans of Liverpool or Manchester United, and when either one of those two comes to the Liberty Stadium it’s the English side they want to win!

One thing I did notice at the England game was the anthems, and how subdued most of the players were when they lined up for them.

For whatever reason, the passion that international rugby teams show to sing along, which leads some to tears at times, doesn’t seem to be there.

Finally, I would like to send all good wishes to Owen Williams, a great player and a great guy, after he suffered a serious injury playing for the Blues in Singapore.

I pray that he makes as full and as speedy a recovery as possible.