Shane Flanagan has been coaching the Cronulla Sharks for 140 games, and is a NRL premiership winner, but he should concentrate his frustrations elsewhere.
As an elite coach he should know better than have a verbal swipe at “referee” Smith, aka Cameron Smith the Melbourne Storm skipper.
Smith will always have a chirp to referees and he’s good at getting what he wants – very good.
But if Flanagan wants to complain after a loss as he did on Thursday night, he should give the complaint some clout.
One of the chinks in rugby league’s armour is players lying all over their tackled opponent, with the purpose of slowing down the tempo of the game.
Rugby league in 2017 is a fast game, gone are the lumbering forwards, and every team has basically 13 backs with six playing up front.
If the tacklers got off the ball carrier quicker, the game would obviously be a whole lot faster, and more entertaining to watch.
Just about every team is guilty of lying all over the ball carrier, but the Melbourne Storm are a serial offender.
They have made it a state-of-the-art tactic. And Roarers won’t believe these figures.
Last Thursday, the Storm made 366 tackles against the Sharks.
Had the two, three, or four Storm defenders kept lying all over the Shark ball carrier for an extra illegal two seconds every tackle – which is hardly noticeable – it adds up to 732 secondS, Or 12.2 minutes, of dead time.
If it’s three seconds a tackle, that’s 1098 seconds, or 18.3 minutes. And if it were four seconds a tackle it would be 1464 seconds, or 24.4 minutes, lost.
Staggering stats.
Yet the referees Matt Cecchin and Gavin Badger penalised the Storm just twice for the illegal play in 366 tackles when they could so easily have pinged the Storm 366 times. Perhaps Flanagan should concentrate on those stats instead of criticising Smith.
And another failing of referees is not policing the kick-off.
In every game I’ve watched this season, there’s always been at least three offside at every kick-off, even though the referee has been near touch with a perfect view along the halfway line.
That’s minor compared to lying all over the tackled player, but once rules are constantly broken they become a law unto themselves.
That’s how rugby league ‘scrums’ became a lean to, just to get 12 forwards out of the action to give the backs extra room.
Rugby league is a great game, but it can be even better if the rules weren’t abused.
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