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The Roar

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Player X misses the mark on video ref debate

The NRL video referees are back under scrutiny (AAP Image/Chris Hyde)
Roar Guru
2nd June, 2012
9

Humans like to whinge. Let’s face it, even the most placid individual has a penchant for spotting injustice and magnifying it. There’s something particularly special about bagging a referee though.

That’s not to say it’s right to unload the contents of the part of your brain that has no filter, but it’s an ever present trait of the sports fan.

Once contained in an emotion free environment again we admit, even if it is begrudgingly, that the whistleblowers have the toughest job in sport.

We concede an expectation that they make the right call in real time is difficult because it took us seven super slo-mo replays to reach the correct outcome.

Player X, writing as he does on a Saturday in the Daily Telegraph, suggested that it’s time the video ref was punted out of his standard definition television box for good.

X has provided some intriguing musings throughout the course of this season.

The veil of anonymity has allowed him to express real opinions. You remember those don’t you? They’re the ones that aren’t media monitored to within an inch of their life.

But this time you’ve gone too far X!

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Yes, some of the rulings coming out of the video ref box are harder to understand than petrol prices (see Sean Hampstead in the dictionary), but it’s a necessary part of the game.

X reasoned that because camera angles “quite often” prove inconclusive, the video referee is in no better position to make a decision than the on field official.

This just isn’t true. Camera angles at varying speeds will more often than not provide clarity to a hazy situation.

How often does a replay show that a player has actually dropped the ball over the line or dragged his foot on the sideline before grounding it?

Without the assistance of replays, spectators would be forced to stomach decisions that are just plain wrong.

To make the situation even more farcical, viewers at home would see the mistake but the man with the job of controlling the game wouldn’t and couldn’t change his initial ruling (see also A-League in the dictionary).

Is that what we really want?

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The problem isn’t the actual job of a video referee, but more the men charged with hitting the red or green button.

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