Legendary referee Nigel Owens lands new role as he confirms return to rugby

The URC’s head of match officials, Tappe Henning, on Monday confirmed the introduction of an independent referee selection panel.

“We changed the structure a bit on how we review our match officials’ performances,” Henning told reporters on Monday.

“In the past, it was done by the five high-performance referees from each union. But now we have a switch for four independent assessors as a selection panel. They are going to do those reviews with me as the chairman of the group.

“By doing this, we have aligned ourselves to the model World Rugby is using to assess international performances. The idea is to bring a fresh pair of eyes and fresh thinking into the model.

“All four of them are recently retired international referees.

“The aim of that then is to get to an elite group of referees selected on merit and not necessarily on representation from each union, to bring credibility to the match officials we appoint. That’s the long-term goal.”

Also on the panel is George Clancy (Ireland), Stuart Berry (South Africa) and Neil Paterson (Scotland).

However, despite being one of the best known figures in rugby union, here RUCK reveal a number of Nigel Owens facts that you might not know about.

Playing rugby at school, his team hadn’t won a game all year, and needed to kick a conversion for victory. It was Nigel’s moment of glory. But it didn’t go to plan. The ball "went closer to the corner flag than it did to the uprights. I was a laughing stock in the school.” His coach suggested, rather forcefully, that it might make more sense for him to oversee the games rather than play in them.

Before becoming a professional rugby union referee, Nigel worked on a dairy farm in west Wales and was also a youth worker. More recently he kicked off his own farming venture at home with a pedigree herd of Hereford cattle in Llanelli. He has since retired from professional refereeing to work on the farm full time.

His long-term partner is Barrie Jones-Davies, a primary school teacher from Llandovery. In October 2019, Jones-Davies joined Owens in Tokyo to support him during the Rugby World Cup.

In the 2016 Birthday Honours, Owens was appointed a Member of the Order of the British Empire (MBE) for services to sport, and was awarded an honorary fellowship from Cardiff University in July of the same year.

Owens loves his Welsh tea so much, that he always makes sure to pack it in his suitcase when heads overseas. He told desert Island Discs that: "“There’s something about a cup of tea that cures so many ills.”