Welcome to Wayne’s world: Barnes lifts lid on the dark side of refereeing

The former referee’s new autobiography is required reading and lays bare some of the more disturbing aspects of modern rugby.

THROWING THE BOOK: Referee Wayne Barnes during the World Cup final. Pic: ©INPHO/James Crombie

There are plenty of amusing rugby anecdotes in Wayne Barnes’s highly readable new autobiography Throwing the Book.

Not least the time, early in his top-level refereeing career, when he had to sin-bin England’s World Cup-winning captain Martin Johnson for an illegal smash on London Irish’s Delon Armitage.