Brian Smith, the England backs coach, today accused Wales of pressurising referee Jonathan Kaplan into giving penalties and yellow cards at the Millennium Stadium.

Wales won 23-13 as the visitors were twice reduced to 14 men with Mike Tindall and Andy Goode each sent to the sin bin for 10 minutes.

England also conceded six penalties in the first 16 minutes of the clash nine days ago and Smith today claimed it was the result of Wales having spoken to Kaplan to highlight their concerns.

England have conceded 11 yellow cards in their last eight Tests and their disciplinary problems are clouding the build up to Saturday's clash with Ireland when the referee will be another South African, Craig Joubert.

Smith said: "The way our team was addressed by the referee before the game took me a little bit by surprise and it was clear to me Wales had done their job at getting stuck into the referee and fair play to them for doing it.

"We don't think there is a conspiracy here and we go week by week. We have had four yellow cards in the first two Six Nations games and we are frustrated by those decisions.

"Our issue is that no doubt the referee played up to Wales because his whole demeanour during the match and in the changing-room before kick-off, he had clearly had heaps of pressure from Wales.

"Teams are doing that because they are looking for whatever advantage they can get and all we are saying is please judge us as you are going to judge other teams and don't come here with a preconceived idea.

"We are hopeful that referee Joubert will get that message across and we are mindful that we have to be seen as whiter than white. We don't coach illegal play and if we can keep our penalties under 10 against Ireland we will have a great chance of winning.

"We just want Ireland to be judged exactly the same as us."

Forwards coach Graham Rowntree admitted that England do not have a constant input from an international referee as suggested by Sir Clive Woodward who used a much stricter system on the way to winning the 2003 World Cup.Rowntree said: "We have addressed the penalties that were awarded and have to be technically more proficient. We do use referees but we don't have someone like Steve Lander who was permanently with the squad under Clive Woodward. We do use referees when training becomes more competitive.

"I don't believe the players are refusing to listen and we do not practise cynicism. Potentially, if you look at the number of yellow cards we have received there appears to be a bit of a bandwagon."

England captain Steve Borthwick has the job of working with the referee during the match and admitted the reasons for penalties were "quite varied" and accepted his players had to be "much better than the opposition" to avoid incurring the official's wrath.

Borthwick said today: "We have to keep our discipline. The margins are so very tight at this level and it's simply hurting us at the moment."

The fly-half kicked all of Wasps' points in a 9-5 Premiership win over Northampton. Club director McGeechan said: "Danny's goal kicking has been the difference in our last two wins. I am sure the England management will get the video of his performance."