Last December, Luke Pearce went viral for marching back Billy Vunipola twice after he back-chatted the referee. Pearce's affirmation of respect won over the majority of the internet, however the referee has revealed he apologised for his actions to Vunipola.
First, let's go back to the incident. It's Exeter v Saracens in the Gallagher Premiership in December 2021 and Pearce penalises Sarries. Vunipola did not take kindly to the decision, firing some verbals the way of the official.
Pearce saw this as out of line, marching the visitors back 10 metres. However, Vunipola kept speaking his mind too, so the referee marched him back another 10 metres. It was quite a sight and became a real talking point with many observers praising the ref.
However, in a recent episode of 'The Rugby Pod', Pearce says he now believes he was wrong to do what he did, and admitted apologising to Vunipola whilst at a Saracens training session.
"He got me. I bit," he said.
"I came off that pitch and I thought, Luke, that is not your style. That is not your personality."
"You're there to be the ref. Of course you're there to not take the s**t if someone is abusive. But there's a fine balance between how you deal with people and making them look stupid and coming out of your style."
"I went into Sarries a couple of months ago for a training session. I spent the day there - just a couple of scrums, couple of lineouts, a bit of game stuff and I just apologised."
"Not to apologise for my behaviour, because Billy was a little bit rude to me. But I said mate, that's not my style, I'm sorry if it came across that way, that's not how I operate."
The podcast clip has become very popular in the past week, pulling in 178,000 views in three days. Viewers didn't understand what he needed to apologise for.
"Billy was out of line, good decision from Luke in my opinion." said one.
"Was the right decision. This makes him better tbh because he's reflecting on how he could have handled it better despite getting it right. Top ref." said another.
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