World Rugby’s chief executive Brett Gosper has suggested that the referee Craig Joubert’s decision to sprint off the Twickenham pitch at full-time after Scotland’s controversial quarter-final defeat to Australia was possibly because “he was keen to get to the bathroom.”

Joubert awarded the Wallabies a penalty, which was later proved to be an incorrect decision, with 43 seconds of the match left. Bernard Foley kicked the penalty to complete a dramatic 35-34 victory for Australia and rob Scotland of a place in the last four.

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Upon blowing for full-time, the South African official then sprinted to the stands without shaking the hands of any of the players, as boos ran round the stadium. World Rugby is expected to publish its review into the performance of Joubert on Monday.

“Mistakes do happen but it’s a tough job,” Gosper told the BBC. “There’s a review taking place of all aspects, including his exit from the pitch. Maybe he was keen to get to the bathroom, who knows? What I would say is that the standard and level of refereeing has been phenomenally high at this Rugby World Cup and they have worked very hard at this tournament.

“There seems to be some controversy around it and we are doing a full review of that,” Gosper later said. “The match officials are assessed by a match assessor, by each team and Joël Jutge, the head of our match officials. We have not had that report back so I can’t comment on the specifics of that situation at the moment. Hopefully some time today we will have a little more fact and will communicate that.” The reviews of a referee’s performance are carried out after each match, not just when a controversial moment has occurred.

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“The referee has not explained to me why he did that [ran off the pitch]. Craig is one of our top referees, a good man and he will have had his reasons,” Gosper added. “We don’t know what was in his head. We are in the process of working that through.”

Joubert’s controversial decision to award Australia a penalty for an accidental Scotland offside was later shown to be incorrect. The Australia scrum-half Nick Phipps admitted after the match he had deliberately attempted to win the loose ball that then struck the Scotland open-side flanker John Hardie. His intent to win the ball cleared Hardie of accidental offside.

“I think everyone was trying to win the ball. We were all going for it,” Phipps said.

Joubert’s judgement and rapid departure from the field provoked a furious response from former players of all nationalities.

The former Scotland player Gavin Hastings said: “If I see referee Craig Joubert again, I am going to tell him how disgusted I am. It was disgraceful that he ran straight off the pitch at the end like that.”

Also among the many outraged voices was the former England scrum-half Matt Dawson, who said on Twitter: “Craig Joubert you are a disgrace and should never referee again!! How dare you sprint off the pitch after that decision!!!”

World Rugby responded to dismay over why the TMO was not consulted by stating that the technology can only be used for the act of scoring a try or an act of foul play.