With so many games swinging on the showing of yellow cards teams must devise strategies for playing with, or against, 14 men. according to Shaun Edwards in The Guardian.
"Back in 2003 England beat the All Blacks in Wellington to register a first win in New Zealand for 30 years and did it with only 13 men at times. In the second half, with the All Blacks trying to claw their way back into the game, the Australian referee Stuart Dickinson lost patience and sent Neil Back and Lawrence Dallaglio to the sin bin. It looked like curtains for England, but somehow Martin Johnson and the other five remaining forwards didn't budge.
Sir Clive Woodward, ever the one to point out that it was attention to the smallest of details that turned matches, explained that it was a situation for which England had practised, while others suggested it was the point when England knew they could go on to win the World Cup. Certainly they were confident enough to beat the Wallabies in Melbourne the following week – the first win on Aussie soil – and from those two victories in June 2003 they went on to lift the Webb Ellis Cup in the autumn.
Come forward seven seasons to this year's Six Nations and there have already been three examples of games where similar yellow-card situations have been handled less cleverly."
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