NRL referees get it wrong, again and again

NRL Grand final influenced heavily on shocking calls by the Ref's once again. A game of footy no matter the code should leave you without the refs in the back of you rmind, mainly they should be invisible but once again they made shocking calls in favour of the Saints more often then not and were invisible when once player has two legs out of touch. How can you have this video refering but not use it when its blaintley obvious the efforts made by one team warrented a result to benifit there defence. This changed the course of the game with the dragons scoreless. Forward passes, no penalties when penatlies were warrented and the attitude that the refs are the to run the game when the game obivously runs itself. Make sure they are back their ten metres, tackles are fair then let the game run itself the players have a pretty bloody good idea of how to play the game after playing for the larger part of their lives. Just get the refs doing their job of monitoring the game not worrying about how they look and what the crowd thinks!

So over the past 5 years the popularity and quality of the game has increased and yet...the referees are crap? How would the game possibly get better if the refs were anywhere near as bad as advertised. A game is really a bunch of guys playing under a rules structure so either over the past 5 years we’ve had a statistically improbable leap in the quality of human playing the game that the bionic man would be impressed by or a more probable improvement has been combined with the refereeing has delivered a higher quality of rules structure to improved game. Yes the refs make mistakes, so do the professional players. Yes there is room for improvement, same as every single other aspect of the game and life in general, I think the pressure on refs is due to bone headed analysts on TV that couldn't pull together 20 credible words excluding mate, football and um and our naivety that prevents us from forming our own opinions. Next we are going to have some moron who has no concept about regulation talk about how the storm salary cap crisis proves that the NRL management are clueless.

you seem to have missed my point. why use the term boyfriends?

Ramo, It was mentioned last night on the NRL show on foxtel that the "bosses" of the refs put the word out to all refs and clubs that if there were repetitive attempts of hands on the ball in the tackle and any high shots were going to be policed strictly with people put in the bin. Hence, my statement above that the referees have to follow the stupid rules that have been set in place. Also last night, they mentioned that the 10 metre advantage law was being scrapped for the rest of the year starting this weekend and it would now be ruled at the decretion of the referee. The word "discretion" was always tagged as a dirty word was it not by Finch and his bozo mate Annelsey? Let me say again, the referees, players and coaches know the laws inside out, so let the refs use discretion on EVERY play ................. PLEASE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

please don't drop them back to the NSW cup.. please don't do that to us!!! on a serious note, you don't need 2 refs...we survived pretty well for decades with only one ref.. also I think they shouldn't have turned them into stars.. ie bill Harrrigan..

the video refs. at the end of the day, ofcours refs make mistakes- but to sin bin someone on a guess and say 'someone stripped the ball" is absolute stupidity. they dont use common sense at all anymore anyone who cant see that is blind!!

I think that it (getting a bigger ego) is a form of protection. You've got to pump up your own tyres because they're forever getting let down or kicked in by others.

It's ridiculous what can the player do if the ball gets kicked into his head? And I meant kicking a ball into the opposition players back.

This is pretty much rubbish. I do think the culture of the refs has to change, but they are not the problem like you think. How often does a player make a mistake at the end of the game that leads to a try. The first that springs to mind is Ashton Sims against Melbourne in the semi final 08. Dropped the ball on a hitup, melbourne grabbed try on the other side of the field. There are countless others that are even more immediate. And what does the coach say after the game? Words to the effect of "It's not Ashton's fault we lost the game, we shouldn't have been in that position in the first place." 12 other players (+ the bench) meant that they were less that one try ahead so a try at the death meant they lost. It's the same thing with the refs. It's not the ref's fault Parra beat the dogs cos of a missed forward pass. If the dogs had been more than one try in front they'd have won the game regardless. Such an easy and lazy whinge to blame the ref. Teams need to take responsibility for their own performance.

"and check with there boyfriends in the box " care to expand on this?

I totally agree with the article. However, I do feel for the ref's. Unfortunately we have taken total control out of the hands of the referee. Common sense does not prevail as it did back in the day of pre-professional footy (I will not call it amateur footy, as guys were getting paid to play, regardless what they say). If ref's make one blunder these days, they get dropped. Their performances are scrutinised every week, where Finch & Annelsey, sit back, watch a replay of every game to review the performance of each ref. The laws have been put in place for the refs to enforce. Just like the policemen and women of our country, they have to enforce the laws, whether they like it or not, because it's their job. They do not create the laws. The pencil pushers at the top do So the question is, who are these people creating the laws of our fine game, and are taking away all power away from the referee? The answer ............. 2 ex-referees (3 if you include Pretty-boy Harrigan) who thought, and still think, they know the game better than any immortal that walked onto the rugby league field. So I will say this, when are we going to get some like-minded "football brains" into the game to clean this up? We are starting to go down the rugby union route of too many rules (which they have tried to clean up since). The game was made to be simple. A game of territory, bravery, passion and guts! It was created by rugby union players who thought there was too many rules in their current game, so they created their own. Run to the end of the field with any means possible and put the ball down over the opponents try-line. SImple. So why don't we get back to that?

Great article!!! Nothing worse than the refs ruining a great game!!! These days trys where they clearly are losing control yet hav a fingernail on it is a try... It's not in the spirit of the game!! Scrap everything and just let the boys play like park footy I rekon

I agree completely. Human errors will always occur and we just unfortunately have to accept some of those. The next time I hear a commentator (who also, when convenient, criticises the video referee) bemoan a mistake being made when "we have the technology to get it right" I will scream. The problem as I see it isn't the occasional mistake, the problem is far more deep-rooted than that. I have a problem with the way the game is over-refereed (and the way referees are over-coached); I don't like players being penalised and cautioned everytime they show aggression, the soft penalties for weak grabs around the shoulders, the banning of quick taps, the 'advantage rule' joke, the sin-binning of players after 'too many penalties' (many of which don't even deserve to be penalties) and, of course, the obstruction circus. These are problems the referees haven't invented themselves, but rather are the result of over-coaching by an unaccountable referees coaching division that has completely lost touch with all common sense associated with the game. All referees are losing control of games DESPITE the fact that players play with extreme discipline and try their hardest to avoid conceding penalties. The simple reason is they are looking way too hard for transgressions, blowing way too many penalties, and frustrating players with their approach. Every game is the same, and the code (which is otherwise thriving so far this season) will suffer for it. As a long-time league fan, it is incredibly frustrating!

Sorry Springs I thought kick would have been self explanitory, and with the ball getting kicked into the players back he is actually offside so it can't be a knock-on. With the falcon example, if it goes forward it's a knock on, if not then play on, simple really and the only way of avoiding an idiotic try like the one on the weekend where it has hit teh player in the chest bounced to behind the defensive line and has had a try scored off it.

firstly...Great article Adrian. Agree with you 100% What is wrong with the nrl bosses and referees!? they have turned the game into a circus. There is no other sport in this world where EVERY week 90% of the talk is about the rules and the referees and trying to guess whats rite and whats wrong. For gods sake, some of the refs are the dumbest ****** ive ever seen. Its bad enough they can no longer rule a try without having to go ipstairs and check with there boyfriends in the box (and even those idiots get it wrong) but they now make ridiculous calls on the field too. HOW THE HELL DO YOU SIN BIN SOMEONE AND SAY "WELL SOMEONE STRIPPED IT"!!?? people go on about how diving is an issue in soccer - but even that is nothing compared to the problems the nrl is facing due to stupid rules that keep changing and refs who have a combines IQ of 3

Refs make mistakes in every sport. It's a fast paced game and no one's perfect. Build a bridge...

What you just said with your third point is that a kick is a knock-on, or a falcon, or if it is kicked into the back. Think about what you say next time. And with forward passes, an example I commonly use, is if a player is sprinting and passes to a player 1 metre behind him in support, then the ball will end up in front of where he was when he passed it. It is called momentum, it's why you jolt forward if you hit the brakes really hard.

As a senior referee myself (although a basketball one, not league), and after many "referee clinics" I don't think it's the referees that are at fault. Yeh sure, there are some crap referees, but there are in every sport. The REAL issue is when it comes down to interpretation of the rules, and what each individual referee feels need to called in any particular situation. And guess what, they're all different. Putting more refs on a game won't fix it, if anything it will make it worse. Sure they can see more of the game (as I'm sure they have different areas of responsibility), but all of a sudden you've now got 5 people with their own interpretation of the rules. You lose consistency play by play, let alone game by game or week by week... And don't get me started on some of the video ref's decisions in recent times.... In short, they're human, you have to live with, scratch that, EXPECT their mistakes.... It's going to happen....