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After Origin I, the NRL should really be looking at itself rather than Paul Gallen as the problem.
Issuing a new rule where any punch thrown lands you 10 in the bin is a good step but it could have been avoided with a few rules changes.
You’ve probably seen the vision at least once but if you haven’t here is what happened: Nate Myles ran the ball up and was halted by two NSW players.
Paul Gallen then came in with a swinging arm and, accidentally or not, hit Myles in the face.
Myles, understandably, reacted by shoving and mouthing off at Gallen, who then landed four punches on Myles face before help from both teams arrived.
There are two ways this fight could have been stopped.
Firstly, outlaw contact with the head.
“Hang on,” I hear you say, “Contact with the head is already outlawed.”
That’s quite true but it isn’t enforced like it is outlawed.
Time after time I see players hit in the face and the referees either miss it or ignore it.
I have never played league but I have played union and American Football before and there are always times when an opposition player intentionally or unintentionally tackles you in a way contrary to what the rules say is allowable.
It is incredibly frustrating when the referee does not award a penalty (or, in gridiron, throw a flag).
I can therefore completely sympathise with Nate Myles when he felt a penalty should have been awarded.
In a club game it probably would have been but, as we all know, the referees – presumably under direction from referees boss Daniel Anderson, who is presumably under direction from the NRL – relax the rules in Origin.
Myles probably wouldn’t have felt it necessary to give Gallen a shove if the contact with his head was penalised, which in turn would not have led to a fight.
Apart from the obvious safety benefits of not clobbering a bloke in the head, penalising all contact with the head would dramatically reduce the number of fights, because most of them are as a result of foul play.
Players would not feel the need to punch a bloke in the face if they knew a penalty was coming their way.
The second rule amendment is to, in some way, punish not only the bloke who throws the first punch but to also penalise the instigator.
I refuse to believe Gallen, or any player for that matter, would punch someone in the face simply for the heck of it.
However, if I were in Gallen’s shoes and Myles gave me a big shove and then some verbal stick, I absolutely would have punched him.
“He physically and verbally challenged me,” Gallen said on Triple M radio last week.
“…Nate said something to me and got up and pushed me. What do you do?”
I hate seeing a fight break out only for the the guy who reacts to be penalised and the instigator escapes reprimand.
I wouldn’t say it is a common occurrence but you do see one player take exception to a tackle and sock the offender in the face, the offender naturally reacts but he is the one penalised.
Another example happened when Manly played the Rabbitohs recently. From a kick-off Steve Matai got George Burgess a bit high, and naturally a penalty was awarded.
As a Manly fan I have to say in slow motion it looked as though Matai’s arm hit the ball and bounced up into Burgess’ face but nevertheless he did make contact with the head and should have been penalised.
However, George’s older brother Sam then came in and shoved an a bent arm into Matai’s back and a melee ensued.
Despite the fact he started a melee, Burgess went unpunished.
Another example: nigglers.
A few years ago Nathan Hindmarsh did something which, by all accounts, was completely uncharacteristic of him and punched on with Michael Ennis.
Ennis is a notorious grub, he is a niggler, he pushes the rules and talks a lot and when there is a fight he is usually nearby.
I understand it would be unpractical to attempt to ban talk but do we really believe Hindmarsh would have reacted the way he did if Ennis was not pushing his buttons?
99 out of 100 times a bloke will throw a punch because in some way he has been provoked.
Therefore, if the provocation was banned there would be less fights.
I’m not saying blokes who throw punches should go unpunished, however, I absolutely hate to see someone who reacts get penalised while the initial offender gets off without reprimand.
A possibility could be as follows.
Players A from team A slaps player B from team B in the face.
Player B reacts and throws a punch.
As the rules currently stands team A would get the penalty, regardless of the events leading up to the punch, and be entitled to a tap or downfield kick plus another set of six.
Perhaps rather than the obviously much more beneficial second option, team A could simply get another set of six.
Additionally, if player B from team B did not react to an obvious attempt to provoke him, his team could get the ball from a scrum.
If any of the rule changes described above were implemented the dust up between Gallen and Myles probably wouldn’t have happened and the media frenzy which surrounded the event wouldn’t have happened either.
Therefore I say it is the NRL’s fault this happened, not Paul Gallen’s.
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