It's the name no Irish rugby fan wants to hear when the match officials are announced for Ireland games, but just what is our record with Wayne Barnes in charge?
Not Wayne Barnes for Ireland v Wales on Fri night! #WALvIRE 😠 where is @Nigelrefowens when you need him? 😆
— Lorraine Mitchell (@Lortino) March 6, 2017
Wayne Barnes reffing #WALvIRE this weekend, worried, flashbacks to him blowing us off the park 2 years ago @gerrythornley @CocoCocosteel
— dan mccabe (@dbullmc) March 7, 2017
In today's Irish Times, Gerry Thornley has laid out the stats for Barnes. He concludes that:
Ireland’s record with Barnes in charge is noticeably worse than with any other referee. All told, Barnes has refereed 13 Irish Test matches, in which Ireland have had four wins and lost nine.
To put those figures into perspective, since the first game Barnes took charge of involving Ireland (our infamous 14-10 win over Georgia in the 2007 World Cup), Ireland have played in 106 Test Matches, winning 59, losing 43, and drawing four.
That works out as a 55.7% win rate, whereas the stats under Barnes have Ireland winning just 30% of games, meaning we're almost half as successful.
Of course, a lot of that is merely coincidence and strength of opponent has to be taken into account. Ireland also have a losing record when playing under everyone's favourite rugby referee Nigel Owens, as Thornley mentions, though it is just by one game, seven wins to eight defeats.
That said, our worst record, for whatever reason, is with Barnes.
The biggest issue for Ireland fans in recent times was the 23-16 defeat the last time Ireland played in Cardiff, when his first half penalising of the team at the breakdown confounded the Irish forwards, who were adamant they weren't illegal. Wales went into a 12-0 lead on the back of those penalties in that game and it's very possible it cost Ireland a Grand Slam.
This Friday will the first time he's refereed an Ireland game since, and there's some real trepidation there that's probably unfair to Barnes. In the five previous times, he's been in charge of the fixture, Ireland have won two and lost three. The second win was a handy 26-3 win in the Aviva Stadium in 2014. The first? Only the Grandslam game in the Millennium Stadium.
So not all bad with Wayne in Cardiff! Although as Thornley points out, if Ireland had lost that game, there would be many talking about the penalty count in that game which favoured Wales 15-5.
There are other games we look to in Barnes' history with Ireland which makes Irish fans shake their head, including the three sin-bin game for our first ever Six Nations defeat to Italy in 2013.
Being honest, it's hard to believe there's an actual issue there, and that any of this is any more than coincidence, but being a superstitious lot, we'd rather it was anyone else this Friday. At best, he's a bad luck charm for Ireland, and we don't need that going to Cardiff.
