Abstract
M.Phil. (Optometry)
It takes a special type of person to be the thirty-first man on the field. This is no mere mortal- but rather a proverbial man amongst giants. It takes a heroic man with the heart of a lion to not only keep a thundering pack of gladiators within the confines of the picturesque, colosseum-like turf, but also bring them into submission when that defined line is crossed. Rugby refereeing is a tremendously difficult task. It requires numerous processes to occur simultaneously, which often leads to inaccurate decision making and mistakes.
This study explores the relationship between the visual skills of rugby referees and the performance of the referees during the 2014 Currie Cup competition. It aims to investigate whether particular visual skills are more influential to rugby referee performance than other visual skills and whether a visual skills training programme can be created to enhance rugby referee performance. The researcher measured the following visual skills in this study: Visual Response Time of dominant eye, Visual Response Time of non-dominant eye, Eye Body Coordination and Central Peripheral Awareness. Additionally, the performance criteria of all participants was measured and rated by the South African Rugby Referees Association and handed over to the researcher following a signing of a Memorandum of Agreement.
A quantitative design approach was taken in researching the relationship between visual skills and performance in rugby referees. Furthermore, a post-positivist stance was chosen as the research paradigm of this study, and the purpose of this study is described as being both descriptive and exploratory. The population consisted of eight participants who had all participated in the 2014 Currie Cup competition.
The data were analysed to statistically assess whether a relationship exists between visual skills and performance of the participants of this study. Data analysis methods utilised the Wilcoxon Signed Ranked Test and various scenarios were created to investigate whether or not differences in weighted criteria render differences in the relationship between the independent variable and the dependent variable. The main finding is that a significant relationship exists between visual skills and the performance of the 2014 Currie Cup rugby referees, and although all the visual skills measured in this study rendered a significant relationship to total performance, Central Peripheral Awareness is the most influential visual skill criteria in total rugby referee performance. Lastly, this study can form the foundation for a visual skills training programme whereby the visual skills are trained and developed to enhance rugby referee performance.