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What will Poite do to infuriate Irish fans this time? James Crombie/INPHO
Ah Ref

Ireland fans will be reunited with their good friend Romain Poite this autumn

The mercurial French referee will take charge of one of Ireland’s games in November.

YOU CAN ALREADY hear the howls of consternation from the Aviva crowd after the announcement that French referee Romain Poite has been handed Ireland’s opening autumn test against South Africa on 8 November.

Poite has a chequered history when refereeing Irish teams – Leinster won the Poite-officiated 2011 Heineken Cup final but he has sinbinned Paul O’Connell for ‘dissent’ while the second row was in the role of captain – and he really is the official that Irish fans love to hate.

The scrum battle will be particularly intense against the Springboks and that is one facet of the game where Poite has been quite fussy in the past, so how he interprets that area will go a long way to deciding who wins.

Poite’s countryman Mathieu Raynal will be in charge of Ireland’s game against Georgia on 16 November while former Saracens out-half Glen Jackson of New Zealand will ref the Australia game six days later.

Welshman Nigel Owens has been given the England vs All Blacks game at Twickenham on 8 November.

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