England v New Zealand referee Angus Gardner received late-night ...

England kick off their Autumn Nations series campaign with a huge clash against New Zealand at the Allianz Stadium, Twickenham, this weekend.

Steve Borthwick's side suffered two defeats at the hands of the All Blacks back in July, narrowly losing 16-15 in the first Test in Dunedin before being beaten 24-17 in Auckland a week later.

The two sides' most recent Twickenham meeting in 2022 ended in a 25-25 draw, while England famously beat the tournament favourites in the semi-final at the 2019 World Cup. However, their last win over the All Blacks on home soil came way back in 2012 when they pulled off a stunning 38-21 victory.

After a difficult few months in the England camp, Borthwick will be hoping for a similar result on Saturday, with a lively match expected to be played out at the home of English rugby.

The man tasked with keeping a lid on proceedings is Australian official Angus Gardner. Here's everything you need to know about today's referee.

Born in Sydney in 1984, Gardner was a keen rugby player as a teenager, but he was forced to give it up when he was diagnosed with a hereditary disc condition called Scheuremann's Disease.

"The doctor was like 'mate, you need to take up fishing' and that was devastating to hear," Gardner told the Sydney Morning Herald. "One of the teachers suggested refereeing as a way of staying involved and I went from there."

He took up refereeing in 1999 aged just 15 but only became a full-time ref eight years ago. He had been appointed to his first Test match four years prior, as he took charge of an Oceania Cup clash between Papua New Guinea and Vanuatu, while he made his Super Rugby debut the following year.

Gardner was appointed to the IRB Junior World Championship in 2012 and 2014, and took charge of the semi-final between England and Ireland in 2014. He was an assistant referee at the 2015 Rugby World Cup, while he made his Six Nations debut in the clash between Ireland and Italy the following year.

He took charge of the Super Rugby final in 2018, the same year he was awarded the prestigious prize of World Rugby Referee of the Year. As well as the 2019 tournament, Gardner also refereed at last year's Rugby World Cup, taking charge of the semi-final between Argentina and New Zealand at the Stade de France.

Earlier this year, Gardner was forced to pull out of the blockbuster clash between South Africa and Ireland at the eleventh hour, due to "personal reasons".

The Aussie official had been due to take charge of the first Test between the two heavyweight sides at Loftus Versfeld in Pretoria on July 6, but was replaced by Englishman Luke Pearce, who also took up the role of assistant referee for the second Test in Durban the following weekend.

The exact reasons why Gardner withdrew were not made public. A World Rugby statement on the matter said: “World Rugby has confirmed that Angus Gardner (Australia) has withdrawn from officiating duties for the two-Test series between South Africa and Ireland for personal reasons.

"The Australian will be replaced by Luke Pearce (England) as referee for the first Test and also as assistant referee for the second Test. As a consequence of the change, there are also further amendments to the appointments, including Christophe Ridley (England), replacing Pearce as assistant referee for Japan v Georgia on 13 July.”

The late withdrawal came nearly five years after Gardner was removed from a game at the 2019 Rugby World Cup in Japan following a controversial performance in a pool match.

France battled to a narrow 23-21 win over Argentina in their Pool C opener in Tokyo, with a Camille Lopez drop-goal 10 minutes from time making the difference. However, they were pushed hard by the Pumas and after the game, French captain Guilhem Guirado complained that that while his side had followed new rules outlawing early engagement in the scrum, the Pumas had ignored them and got away with it, with Gardner failing to act on it.

“We worked for weeks not to engage early," hooker Guirado was quoted as saying by L’Equipe at the time. "And on the first three scrums they put pressure on us and the referee didn’t say much." His front row partner, prop Jefferson Poirot, gave a far more blunt assessment, saying simply: "We got screwed."

The under-fire Gardner was due to be an assistant referee in the Pumas' clash with England later in the tournament, but was removed ahead of the game. RugbyPass reported that the official had "come in for internal criticism" for his performance in the France match, with Ben O'Keefe replacing him for Argentina v England.

Gardner has dealt with his fair share of criticism during his time as a referee but Springboks boss Rassie Erasmus took things to an unacceptable level after the 2018 Rugby Championship.

After both of South Africa games that Gardner refereed during the tournament, Erasmus sent him emails, ignoring the protocols of asking for clarification on match incidents through official World Rugby channels.

Indeed, The Times reported at the time that, after one defeat, an unhappy Erasmus reportedly made an early-hours phone call to the Australian referee, leading the coach to be reprimanded by World Rugby.

That same year, Gardner took charge of South Africa's narrow 12-11 defeat to England at Twickenham, when Owen Farrell escaped punishment for a no-arms hit on Springbok centre Andre Esterhuizen. Following the match, a spoof video taken from inside the Springboks camp emerged online, in which Erasmus was seen teaching Esterhuizen how to tackle high and with no arms.

The referee later admitted he may have made the wrong decision in not taking action against Farrell, telling Will Greenwood's Sky Sports podcast: "I think in hindsight now, having discussed it with some other referees... I think the general consensus would be that a penalty was probably the outcome there that should have been given.

"I think we need to see a wrap with both arms, and I think in hindsight - although he got pinned - there wasn't a big enough wrap from both arms, really. There was a wrap with one arm, but there wasn't a wrap with the other arm.

"Of the angles that I was showed in the stadium at the time, that seemed to me to be enough of a wrap for me to constitute a legal tackle," he added. "It was never high, and so all we were looking at was the tackle technique. The collision itself also kind of swayed my decision because it was a big rugby collision, and we see these hits in the game."

Gardner was a touch judge for the first Bledisloe Cup Test between his native Australia and New Zealand back in 2020, but ended up angering his fellow countrymen as he made an error that ended up costing the Wallabies the win.

Jordie Barrett gave the All Blacks the perfect start as he crossed for a try early in the first half, but Gardner missed the fact that his team-mate Reiko Ioane had actually stepped into touch in the build-up. Replays showed Ioane's foot clearly in touch but it was not noticed by the line judge as the score stood, with Australia fighting back as the game finished 16-16.

Fans were left fuming by the error, judging it to be "unacceptable" and claiming that it had cost the Wallabies victory.

Gardner soon admitted he had got it wrong after the game, telling Aussie radio station Gold AM that it was "a genuine miss", as he explained: "Sometimes it happens at that speed. Obviously I put my hand up for it.

“We’re there to referee the game whether it’s the All Blacks or the Wallabies or Wellington or Otago or Chiefs versus Crusaders. Our job’s just the game, it shouldn’t matter who the two teams are.”

Referee: Angus Gardner (AUS)

Assistant Referees: Pierre Brousset (FRA) & jordan Way (AUS)

TMO: Marius van der Westhuizen (SA)