World Rugby: Australia's winning penalty vs Scotland 'should have been a scrum'

Joubert awarded the Wallabies an incorrect penalty with 43 seconds left which was kicked by Bernard Foley to complete a dramatic 35-34 victory for Australia and rob the Scots of a place in the last four.

"There seems to be some controversy around it and we are doing a full review of that," World Rugby chief executive Brett Gosper said on Monday morning.

"The match officials are assessed by a match assessor, by each team and Joel Jutge, the head of our match officials.

"We have not had that report back so I can't comment on the specifics of that situation at the moment. Hopefully some time today we will have a little more fact and will communicate that."

And on Monday evening, World Rugby confirmed a review found that the correct decision should have been a scrum for Australia.

"Following a full review of match officials’ performance, the World Rugby match official selection committee has clarified the decision made by referee Craig Joubert to award a penalty to Australia for offside in the 78th minute of the Rugby World Cup 2015 quarter-final between Australia and Scotland at Twickenham.

"The selection committee confirms that Joubert applied World Rugby Law 11.7 penalising Scotland’s Jon Welsh, who had played the ball following a knock-on by a team-mate, resulting in an offside.

"On review of all available angles, it is clear that after the knock-on, the ball was touched by Australia’s Nick Phipps and Law 11.3(c) states that a player can be put on-side by an opponent who intentionally plays the ball.

"It is important to clarify that, under the protocols, the referee could not refer to the television match official in this case and therefore had to rely on what he saw in real time. In this case, Law 11.3(c) should have been applied, putting Welsh onside. The appropriate decision, therefore, should have been a scrum to Australia for the original knock-on.

"Overall, it is widely recognised that the standard of officiating at Rugby World Cup 2015 has been very high across 44 compelling and competitive matches to date."

Jutge, match official manager for World Rugby, did however go on to defend Joubert.

"Despite this experience, Craig has been and remains a world-class referee and an important member of our team,” he said.