Forget the ‘crusher’, the ‘scorpion’ or even the ‘snake bite’. The ‘third man in’ has become the latest scourge of the NRL.
The third man beats them all, although all four (and a few more) need eradicating.
We have repeatedly seen players getting injured by the sneaky late assailant. Under the current rules the referee can’t do anything about it, and this needs to change.
I believe the RLIF need to change the rules and only allow two defenders in a tackle at one time.
Now I know what you saying – the referees have enough trouble working out whether there is two in a tackle when it come to stripping the ball.
But I have that covered too.
The intention of the rule should be to only allow two defenders to be in contact with the attacker at any one time.
This means that if a player breaks free of the initial two defenders, those same two wouldn’t be expected to be the only defenders on the park to stop the attacking players’ progress. There just can’t be more than two at any one time.
Under the current strip rule, if the initial defender falls off the tackle and the second player strips the ball, it is generally a penalty.
I would change this to allow either of the two defenders in the tackle to strip the ball, even if of one of those two defenders falls off and another defender joins in. As long as there are only two defenders in contact with the attacker at any one time, it’s a fair tackle.
Although this is only scratching the surface and there are other infringements in the tackle that need addressing, this would be a start.
These changes will force the attacking team to put a greater focus on ball security then they currently do, clean up the grey area in the strip rule, put on end to the gang tackle/third man in and – most importantly – provide a safer environment for our stars to shine in.
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All the team list information for Round 9.
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