I’ve been pondering recently what would happen if we swapped the referees for a Rugby and Football match.

Lets ignore the fact that not even the Rugby referees seem to know what happens in a scrum, and assume that both referees knew the rules of the opposition sport.

I predict that the rugby ref would not be able to contain his laughter with some of the dives and feigned injuries from the footballers. Wouldn’t you just love to see someone rolling round on the floor only for the ref to continue the game.

Conversely I doubt the game would get past the first 5 minutes the amount of stoppages there would be. Whistle - that bloke who just got tackled hasn’t got up yet, lets stop the game and check he is alright.

Moving on to more sinister aspects of the game. All the argy bargy in football would be ignored. “He didn’t punch him in the face, it isn’t a foul”. However in a rugby game no-one would be left at the end. I don’t care if you just gave him a little shove, that is a red card.

I know that people are worried that rugby is starting to go the way of football with people (Such as the Argentinian number 9) asking for others to be yellow carded, but I for one would love to see football played with the same spirit and respect as rugby. Its never going to happen, but it would be great.

There would be a minor scuffle and the football ref would send everyone off.