SPORTING a skin tone that erred on the dayglo side of vivid and hinted that he might have nodded off in Gavin Henson's personal tanning studio the previous evening, it was a wonder that Steve Walsh, the New Zealand referee who gave Scott Murray his marching orders during last weekend's Wales v Scotland match in Cardiff, marked the player's departure with a terse explanation of the laws and not a cry of "You've been Tangoed".

Such coppertoned buffoonery would have been in keeping with the showboating inclinations of an official whose fondness for the limelight would make the average Big Brother entrant seem a the victim of a crippling shyness.

Walsh typically tops off his burnished look with the sort of lustrous bouffant sculpture that is a testament to his familiarity with a sophisticated range of personal grooming products as well as a gesture of defiance towards both gravity and good taste. Yet it is in the figurative sense that he has been a hair-raising presence around the pastures of international rugby in recent years, for he has twice lost the plot in spectacular fashion.

The first occasion was in 2003, when he got involved in name-calling with England fitness coach Dave Reddin at that year's Rugby World Cup. The second was for levelling abuse at Ireland wing Shane Horgan while acting as a touch judge during the Lions visit to his homeland last year. On both occasions the International Rugby Board (IRB), gave him a token punishment and returned him to the international whistling fold.

At this point we are entitled to wonder what might have happened had the boot been on the other foot, and ask what the sanction would have been had it been a player insulting an official. Fortunately, the IRB provides this very answer, neatly tabulated in Appendix 1 of their Regulation 17, entitled Recommended Sanctions for Offences Within the Playing Enclosure.

Against the entry for Threatening Actions or Words at Match Officials, it advises that a typical offence should attract a 12-month suspension, rising to 24 months in more serious cases, with a maximum penalty of three years.

Nobody seems to know the punishment handed down to Walsh after his verbals with Horgan - which brought a complaint from the Lions management - but as a proven repeat offender it seems remarkable that he is anywhere near international rugby today.

When a player loses selfcontrol, the game suffers.

When it is a referee who lapses, the sport's foundations are shaken. What shred of authority does Walsh bring to the scenario of telling a player to behave? As the only possible answer is none the only possible conclusion is that Walsh should not be refereeing.

It has become common to argue that the best referees are also the least conspicuous (on which basis we might commend the IRB's referees' grading system for advancing Scottish officials to the point where they are invisible at the top level of the international game) but that position oversimplifies the matter. The strutting peacock school, of which Walsh is the most obvious graduate, is an irksome extreme, but good officials must have the sort of presence rarely exuded by life's shrinking violets - they must know when to act and when to hold their peace.

This provides an ironic backdrop, for in dismissing Murray, Walsh acted with a wisdom that, as we now know, has not always attended his dealings at international level. He spotted Murray's offence, and the late tackle by Ian Gough that provoked it. The laws demanded that Murray be shown red, while Walsh's judgment was that Gough deserved yellow. For once, the New Zealander played his cards right.

And in accepting his punishment with good grace, and apologising to Gough, so too did Murray. Later, Gough was only one of a platoon of Welsh players who called for leniency for Murray, an admirable display on behalf of a decent individual whose offence was at the bottom end of the scale. Wisely, the discipline panel on Wednesday agreed with the Welsh players, handing down a three-week ban that most observers considered fitting.

And hopefully, that is how the situation will remain. The SRU has until 1pm today to lodge an appeal against Murray's sentence, and has not yet confirmed that it will not do so. But if there is any sense in the institution, they will let the deadline pass.