Irish rugby ref finished top ten in fitness test with England squad

Wayne Barnes describes fellow referee JP Doyle as competitive, while Doyle described Barnes as steadfast.

England Rugby today shared a video of Wayne Barnes and JP Doyle training with their fellow RFU referees with both sharing information on their fitness levels. Irishman Doyle participated in an equivalent to the infamous bleep test with the England squad and was in the top 10 while another referee participated with a championship club and was in the top 4.

Doyle described the task for referees as 50/50 physical and technical trying to keep up with new tactics from teams and coaches.

As this is Doyle’s first rugby world cup as a referee, his colleague Barnes said: “My advice to people when refereeing your first premiership match or first international match is to have a look around, take it all in and remember it, because wow it goes so quickly.”

Post match reviews are carried out in a room full of their peers.

Doyle said: “It’s a safe environment, but it’s fairly brutal... we will challenge each other on how we delivered the game, the decisions we made, our movement we did, everything comes under the microscope.”