Wales fear for ‘marked man’ Jenkins

Wales forwards coach Robin McBryde fears that prop Gethin Jenkins might have become “a marked man” in Test match rugby.

Jenkins was sin-binned for the second successive RBS Six Nations game on Sunday when Wales’ title hopes were destroyed by England at Twickenham.

As when he received a yellow card in the France Test two weeks earlier, 104 times-capped Jenkins looked bewildered that he had been punished for a perceived scrummaging offence.

And McBryde has now gone into bat for the 33-year-old, while also revealing that Wales will contact Twickenham match official Romain Poite and International Rugby Board referees’ chief Joel Jutge for “clarity” over the scrums.

“My concern is Gethin is a marked man and that there is a preconception out there with him,” McBryde said.

“He is vastly-experienced and been there with the (British and Irish) Lions and Wales. We feel we have a dominant scrum, and if you come up against one you will try every ploy in the book to negate the advantage the opposition have.

“We only had two scrums on our ball. We got a penalty from the first – clearly dominant – and the second we cleared our lines off a solid foundation. My concern is that we are falling foul because of a perception out there.

“Things we focused on going into the game, with good dialogue from Joel Jutge, were stability when the packs come together and not pushing through the mark. We did that to the best of our ability, and it takes two sides to agree to that.

“It is very hard for a loosehead to create an angle for himself when the guy you are pushing against is not pushing straight. I felt Gethin was pushing straight.

“It is tough on the referee because I think there was a poor call from one of his touch judges with regards to Gethin again, when clearly the (England) tighthead was binding his arm and he (Jenkins) could not get his arm up.

“Romain can’t see that, and I am not being too critical of him. We have to get that clarity so we can move on.

“Until then, it is a guessing game, and the fact there was only one reset (scrum) and decisions were made straight away, he has to be pretty certain he is making the right decision and not guessing.

“The unfortunate thing is that one man has been singled out, and everyone could see the dejection on Gethin’s face when he came off as he didn’t know what else he could have done.

“I will be sending an email to both Romain and Joel for clarity, because it is important in how we move forward, learn lessons and make sure we are looking at the same things Joel is.”