Friday 16 March 2018 10:16, UK
Assistant referee Marius van der Westhuizen will be replaced by Nigel Owens for Saturday's Six Nations match between England and Ireland.
The South African refereed an England training session this week and in order to "avoid any additional unfair and unnecessary conjecture", he has now been stood down for the match at Twickenham by World Rugby.
"World Rugby has confirmed that Marius van der Westhuizen will be replaced by Nigel Owens as Assistant Referee 2 for the Natwest 6 Nations match between England and Ireland at Twickenham on Saturday," World Rugby said in a statement.
"The decision follows Marius' attendance at an England training session this week.
"While greater dialogue and collaboration between match officials and teams [including attending team training on request] has been agreed by World Rugby and the teams, Marius should not have been involved given that he was a member of the match official team for the weekend's match.
"World Rugby takes responsibility for this oversight and has taken the proactive decision to stand Marius down to avoid any additional unfair and unnecessary conjecture.
"Marius is an outstanding talent with a big international future and both he and his employer SARU fully support the decision.
"World Rugby has also clarified with teams that, in addition to the regular pre-match coach and referee meetings, senior elite teams will continue to have the opportunity to request that a member of the high-performance match official panel attends training providing that the individual is not a member of the match official team officiating that team at a later date within the current competition or test window."
