Phillips Called Up For Junior World Championship Duty

Dudley Phillips’ appointment to the nine-man referees panel for the Under-20 tournament is another step on the road to becoming a Test match referee.

Fellow IRFU referees Peter Fitzgibbon and John Lacey have benefited from refereeing Junior World Championship matches in past seasons, before taking charge of senior international fixtures more recently.

Phillips, a regular on the Ulster Bank League and RaboDirect PRO12 circuits, made his Heineken Cup refereeing debut last season and was assistant referee for his first full international game in November – Wales v Argentina in Cardiff.

The Dubliner, who turns 35 next month, has a long association with St. Mary’s College RFC – he played with the club until he was 24 – and is a member of the Leinster and IRFU refereeing panels.

Selected by the IRB Match Official Selection Committee, Phillips and eight other referees will officiate at the upcoming Junior World Championship which takes place from June 5 to 23 in Nantes, Vannes and La Roche-sur-Yon in north-west France.

In keeping with the IRB strategy to expand and develop the talent pool of officials, many of the panel will attend a Junior World Championship for the first time, while three of them have acted as assistant referees in a previous edition.

The key developmental tournament, which has so far provided the springboard for 196 players to graduate to international Test level, also provides a similar role for aspiring Test referees.

Romain Poite, Chris Pollock, Jérôme Garcès and Greg Garner are just some of the established whistle blowers that have officiated on the JWC stage in the past.

IRB Match Official Selection Committee Chairman John Jeffrey believes it is a great opportunity for referees.

“The IRB Junior World Championship is an important part of our process to develop referees and the great thing is that four referee selectors are in camp with the match officials for the duration of the tournament,” he said.

“So they are coaching them, they are developing them, they are getting feedback and it’s a huge development tool. It is just a great way of developing the next generation of elite level referees.”

As part of the IRB strategy to further develop match officials across the world, this summer’s JWC will see no Union have more than one representative on the panel.

The IRB Junior World Championship is part of a process to ensure the highest quality referees are in place for the 2015 Rugby World Cup, as it gives officials the perfect environment to learn from each other as a group, focus on continual coaching, assessment and mentoring to ensure the best-possible standards of consistency and performance.

2013 IRB JUNIOR WORLD CHAMPIONSHIP MATCH OFFICIALS:

Referees –

Akihisa Aso (JRFU)
Stuart Berry (SARU)
Ian Davies (WRU)
Mike Fraser (NZRU)
Andrew Lees (ARU)
Andrew McMenemy (SRU)
Marius Mitrea (FIR)
Luke Pearce (RFU)
Dudley Phillips (IRFU)

Television Match Officials –

Eric Gauzins (FFR)
Graham Hughes (RFU)

Interested in becoming an IRFU referee? Click here.

Related Links –

IRB Junior World Championship Fixtures

IRB Junior World Championship Ticket Information