Try or No try

You decide

The try is rugby's crowning glory. It is the referee's most important decision. It's the one he simply does not want to get wrong, hence the technological assistance of recent years. We are going to look at some situations. You are the referee. You have to make the decision.

The decision could be a try, a drop-out, a penalty or a scrum.

If it is a try, say where you would award the try. If it is a penalty or a scrum, say where you would award the scrum.

Don't look now but you can find the answers in Law 22.

We shall also provide answers, but be honest - as all referees always are - and try it on your own first before you peep. After all, who knows, perhaps we are wrong.

The teams playing are the Irish Thinkers and the British Doers.

1. The Irish Thinkers are on the attack. Aristotle Wallace, the Irish Thinkers prop, bursts for the line. He is felled by Richard Stevenson. Wallace falls, reaches out with the ball in his right hand and presses it against the ground and the thick padding around the goal-post.

2. The Irish Thinkers are on the attack. Aristotle Wallace, the Irish Thinkers prop, bursts for the line. He is held by several English Doers defenders but stretches out and presses the ball against the padding around the goal-posts about a metre above the ground.

3. Ben Jenner, the English Doers wing, kicks the ball into the It in-goal. He follows up and dives in an attempt to score a try. He dives slightly beyond the ball but as his body comes down his thighs come down on the ball and press it to ground. Jenner then slides beyond the ball, and Plato Dempsey, the Irish Thinkers fullback, uses his hands to ground the ball.

4. Socrates Horgan, the Irish Thinkers wing, rounds Jason Faraday, the English Doers fullback who sprawls on the ground, and crosses the English Doers goalline near the corner-flag. He turns to score under the posts. The only other person in the in-goal area is you the referee. Horgan bumps into you and loses the ball forward.

5. Socrates Horgan, the Irish Thinkers wing, rounds Jason Faraday, the English Doers fullback who sprawls on the ground, and crosses the English Doers goalline near the corner-flag. He turns to score under the posts. The only other person in the in-goal area is you the referee. Horgan bumps into you, retains the ball and does a posh dive the ground the ball under the posts.

6. Socrates Horgan, the Irish Thinkers wing, rounds Jason Faraday, the English Doers fullback who sprawls on the ground, and crosses the English Doers goalline near the corner-flag. He turns to score under the posts. There is no other player within 20 metres of him. Suddenly Peat Forsale, clearly an English Doers supporter, comes running out of the crowd and tackles Horgan.

7. The ball is lying in the Irish Thinkers in-goal area, a centimetre inside the touch-in-goalline. Matt Whittle, the English Doers scrum-half, is lying in touch-in-goal. Seeing the ball, he stretches out a hand and, still lying there, presses down on the ball.

8. The English Doers heel the ball in a scrum five metres from their goalline. They are under pressure in the scrum and the ball is under the feet of their No.8, Lawrence Shrapnel. As the English Doers pack is pushed back, the ball reaches their goalline and is on the goalline when Pericles Stringer, the Irish Thinkers scrum-half, dives on the ball.

9. A maul forms a metre from the Irish Thinkers goalline. Demosthenes O'Kelly, the Irish Thinkers lock, has the ball but his side is being pushed back. The Irish Thinkers side of the maul crosses their goalline,. Neil Newton, the English Doers flank, darts round the maul, burrows into it from the Irish Thinkers side, grabs the ball and drops to the ground with it, grounding it in the Irish Thinkers in-goal area.

10. Jonny Davy, the English Doers fly-half, breaks and heads for the Irish Thinkers line. Empedocles Quinlan, the Irish Thinkers flank, tackles him. They both go to ground. Quinlan still holding Davy. The ball is under Davy's chest. He moves aside and with the ball kin his left hand stretches out and places the ball on the Irish Thinkers goalline.

To go to the answers, click here.