Stuart Dickinson (born 19 July 1968) is an Australian former

Rugby union Rugby union, commonly known simply as rugby, is a close-contact team sport that originated at Rugby School in the first half of the 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand. In its m ...

referee A referee is an official, in a variety of sports and competition, responsible for enforcing the rules of the sport, including sportsmanship decisions such as ejection. The official tasked with this job may be known by a variety of other titl ...

. Dickinson has refereed in many rugby competitions, including the

Rugby World Cup The Rugby World Cup is a men's rugby union tournament contested every four years between the top international teams. The tournament is administered by World Rugby, the sport's international governing body. The winners are awarded the Webb E ...

, Tri Nations, Six Nations, international friendlies, Super 12/14/15, and

Shute Shield The Shute Shield is a semi-professional rugby union competition in Sydney, Australia. It is the premier club competition in New South Wales. The Shute Shield is awarded to the winning team from the Sydney premiership grand final held at the end ...

. He was a referee at the

1999 Rugby World Cup The 1999 Rugby World Cup was the fourth Rugby World Cup, the quadrennial international rugby union championship. It was principally hosted by Wales, and was won by Australia. This was the first Rugby World Cup to be held in the sport's professi ...

, the

2003 Rugby World Cup The 2003 Rugby World Cup was the fifth Rugby World Cup. Originally planned to be hosted by India, all games were shifted to Australia following a contractual dispute over ground signage rights between the Indian Rugby Union and Rugby World Cup ...

, and the

2007 Rugby World Cup The 2007 Rugby World Cup was the sixth Rugby World Cup, a quadrennial international rugby union competition inaugurated in 1987. Twenty nations competed for the Webb Ellis Cup in the tournament, which was hosted by France from 7 September to 2 ...

. He is Australia's most-capped referee, and the only Australian referee to appear at three Rugby World Cups.

Referee career

Dickinson commenced refereeing at the age of 12 while also playing fly-half and fullback for Epping Boys' High School. He was employed full-time with the

Australian Rugby Union Rugby Australia Ltd, previously named the Australian Rugby Union Limited and Australian Rugby Football Union Limited, is an Australian company operating the premier rugby union competition in Australia and teams. It has its origins in 1949. It ...

(ARU) from 1996 to 2011. Prior to 1996, he worked as a site manager for

Linfox Linfox is an Australian transport and logistics and supply chain business founded in 1956 by Lindsay Fox. History Linfox was established in 1956 by Lindsay Fox as Lindsay Fox Cartage with one truck in Melbourne. In 1958, a contract with Schwep ...

, a transport company as well as with the

New South Wales Police Force The New South Wales Police Force (NSW Police Force; previously the New South Wales Police Service and New South Wales Police) is the primary law enforcement agency of the state of New South Wales, Australia. Divided into Police Area Commands (P ...

. He made his international refereeing debut in 1997 in a

qualifier between

Tahiti Tahiti (; Tahitian ; ; previously also known as Otaheite) is the largest island of the Windward group of the Society Islands in French Polynesia. It is located in the central part of the Pacific Ocean and the nearest major landmass is Austr ...

and

Papua New Guinea Papua New Guinea (abbreviated PNG; , ; tpi, Papua Niugini; ho, Papua Niu Gini), officially the Independent State of Papua New Guinea ( tpi, Independen Stet bilong Papua Niugini; ho, Independen Stet bilong Papua Niu Gini), is a country i ...

. He refereed his first international match between two Tier 1 nations a year later for the 1998 international between

Wales Wales ( cy, Cymru ) is a Countries of the United Kingdom, country that is part of the United Kingdom. It is bordered by England to the Wales–England border, east, the Irish Sea to the north and west, the Celtic Sea to the south west and the ...

and

South Africa South Africa, officially the Republic of South Africa (RSA), is the southernmost country in Africa. It is bounded to the south by of coastline that stretch along the South Atlantic and Indian Oceans; to the north by the neighbouring countri ...

at Wembley. Dickinson refereed several pool games in the 2007 Rugby World Cup, including Fiji's upset of Wales. Shortly after the 2007 World Cup, Dickinson authored a book entitled "The Rugby World Cup Diaries – A referee's inside view." Dickinson was publicly criticised by IRB referees manager Paddy O'Brien for his refereeing of the scrums in the Italy v New Zealand Test Match at the

San Siro Stadium Stadio Giuseppe Meazza, commonly known as San Siro, is a football stadium in the San Siro district of Milan, Italy, which is the home of A.C. Milan and Inter Milan. It has a seating capacity of 80,018, making it one of the largest stadiums in ...

Milan Milan ( , , Lombard: ; it, Milano ) is a city in northern Italy, capital of Lombardy, and the second-most populous city proper in Italy after Rome. The city proper has a population of about 1.4 million, while its metropolitan city h ...

on 14 November 2009. O'Brien stated that Dickinson had got it "completely wrong", believing the Italian tight-head prop,

Martin Castrogiovanni Martin may refer to: Places * Martin City (disambiguation) * Martin County (disambiguation) * Martin Township (disambiguation) Antarctica * Martin Peninsula, Marie Byrd Land * Port Martin, Adelie Land * Point Martin, South Orkney Islands Austral ...

was boring in on his opposite. This led to outrage by the Australian Rugby Union, who issued a formal complaint to the IRB against Paddy O'Brien. O'Brien ended up apologising to Stuart Dickinson and the Australian Rugby Union: "I have unreservedly apologised to Stuart Dickinson for the action of publicly discussing elements of his performance review and would like to extend that apology to the Australian Rugby Union," said O'Brien.

Retirement

In 2010 despite being rated in the Top 3 SANZAR Referees (after being appointed to the Super Rugby semi-final in Soweto) he was overlooked for the 6 Nations tournament for the first time since 2000. Then in 2011 Dickinson was overlooked for the Rugby World Cup. O'Brien denied there was any vendetta against Dickinson. Dickinson subsequently announced his retirement from refereeing on 27 September 2011.

Test Match Honour Roll

At the Townsville District Rugby Union Referees Dinner on 2 October 2009, Dickinson confirmed (at that time) he had refereed 43 international matches in total. 41 of those matches are listed below. *1997 Papua New Guinea v Tahiti *1997 Tonga v Cook Islands *1998 Canada v Argentina *1998 Hong Kong v South Korea *1998 Wales v South Africa *1999 New Zealand v France *1999 Scotland v Uruguay (World Cup) *1999 Argentina v Japan (World Cup) *1999 Ireland v Argentina (World Cup) *2000 France v England *2000 South Africa v England *2000 Wales v Samoa *2001 France v Scotland *2001 England v Italy *2001 New Zealand Maoris v Argentina *2001 England v South Africa *2002 Japan v South Korea *2002 Chinese Taipei v South Korea *2002 Fiji v Tonga *2002 New Zealand v South Africa *2002 Wales v Fiji *2003 New Zealand v England *2003 Scotland v Japan (World Cup) *2003 South Africa v Georgia (World Cup) *2004 Wales v France *2004 New Zealand v Pacific Islanders *2005 British and Irish Lions v Argentina *2005 England v Barbarians *2005 Wales v South Africa *2006 Ireland v Scotland *2006 New Zealand v Ireland *2006 South Africa v France *2006 France v New Zealand *2007 New Zealand v France *2007 New Zealand v South Africa *2007 USA v Tonga (World Cup) *2007 Argentina v Namibia (World Cup) *2007 Wales v Fiji (World Cup) *2008 Ireland v England *2008 New Zealand v South Africa *2008 New Zealand v Samoa *2008 Wales v Canada *2009 England v France *2009 South Africa v British and Irish Lions *2009 Italy v New Zealand *2010 Argentina v France * 2011 New Zealand vs Fiji

2010 Super 14 season

*Round 1, 12 February 2010: Hurricanes 34 – 20 Blues *Round 7, 26 March 2010: Highlanders 39 – 29 Lions *Round 8, 2 April 2010: Western Force 16 – 15 Stormers *Round 9, 10 April 2010: Blues 21 – 33 Stormers *Round 12, 30 April 2010: Stormers 42 – 14 Crusaders *Round 13, 8 May 2010: Sharks 20 – 14 Stormers *Semi-Final, 22 May 2010: Bulls 39 – 24 Crusaders

References

External links

Stuart Dickinson
on rwc2003.irb.com

IRB.com

sport.iafrica.com {{DEFAULTSORT:Dickinson, Stuart 1968 births Living people People educated at Epping Boys High School Australian rugby union referees Rugby World Cup referees Super Rugby referees The Rugby Championship referees Six Nations Championship referees ARU referees