Stewart’s offside try wasn't the first and won’t be the last

Raiders fans were rightly (yet belatedly) blowing up on Sunday after Brett Stewart scored the match-winning try from an ‘offside’ position. I’ve seen it happen in a State of Origin match too – and I should know since I was responsible for missing it.

The laws of rugby league are clear on where the attacking players need to be standing at the play the ball. If you’re on the team with the ball, you must be behind the line of your mate who is about to play the ball.

We’ve previously discussed the old ‘mousetrap’ play, and how the laws were changed to allow its execution, but this is different.

Russell Smith, the Englishman who left a stellar refereeing career in the British Isles to forge his way in Australia’s NRL, is now a referee coach and was influential in me getting my start as a touch judge.

He once told me, after this exact law was brought up one day, “Ellery Hanley must have scored a couple of dozen tries that way. He’d overrun the play, wait in the defensive line and pick up the pass from the next play the ball.”

When Russ was running around in England, with one referee and very limited communication with his touchies, it’s very difficult to pick up. Unless you’re specifically looking for the attacking player in front of the play-the-ball he is almost impossible to track for the official with the flag.

It’s the same story on Sunday, where Stewart had overrun the previous play, and after he’d pulled up on his run found himself midway between the Raiders defenders and teammate Jorge Taufua, who was about to play the ball.

The wording, in Section 11 (g) of the laws states: “Players of the side in possession other than the player taking part in the play-the-ball and the acting halfback must retire behind their players involved in the play-the-ball or to their own goal-line”.

As you can see ‘their players’ is a bit ambiguous, which is why the NRL has ‘interpretations’. These interpretations are much-derided among league fans, but you can see how we need to somehow clear up what ‘retire behind their players’ means in practical terms.

Remember, in 1895 when the wise men met at the George Hotel in Huddersfield and created our great game, they didn’t consider slow-motion replays and freeze frame video.

So the NRL’s present interpretation is if Stewart gets himself in line with Taufua at any stage of the play, then he is permitted to take part in the play. This is at odds with the rest of the rugby league world, where if you’re in front of the play-the-ball you are ‘out of play’ until the next play the ball (which is specified in the Notes to Section 14 ‘Offside’ – “Out of Play” as opposed to “offside”).

In other words, Stewart cannot be ‘placed onside’ by any of the regular methods we see in general play (such as his kicker running in front of him, or a fumble by the opposing fullback).

What happened on Sunday, with Canberra leading by four points and the dying minutes of the game ticking down, is that Stewart failed to retire behind Taufua but backed up his teammates on the inside anyway. Picking up the final pass, Stewart streaked away to score what was the winning try and the Raiders’ season received the final nail in its coffin.

Should it have been disallowed? Yes. Should we get into a panic about how it should have been penalised and how our officials are incompetent? No.

Let me take you through what goes on in this circumstance. Foremost, this was the touch judge’s responsibility, along with the assistant referee. The touchie needs to be aware of who is around the play-the-ball at the same time, as they are helping to clear tacklers out of the ruck to enable a timely resumption of play, and then switch to checking on the pass from dummy half to ensure it’s not forward.

At the same time the touch judge is expected to monitor the defenders on the near side and alert the referee if they are not back the 10 metres or have shot up early, as well as keeping an eye on the markers being square and any cheap-shot slaps post-tackle.

Once the ruck is checked off, the defenders are cleared and the pass is given the green light, the focus switches to the angles of the support runners and who is moving where, so that the tough judge can help with potential obstruction play, players being hit late off the ball, and support runners being dragged back.

There’s a lot to look at, and if you were sitting next to me while we were watching a game as I was explaining what I was seeing, I couldn’t get the words out quick enough before we’d be at the next tackle, with it all to do again. In a matter of five seconds all of that information needs to be assessed.

Brett Stewart started walking back to his line after the play-the-ball on Sunday but stopped at about a metre and a half short. Taufua walked forward, dissolving the point of the play-the-ball.

We also had the appointed assistant referee, Dave Munro, retire from the game with a calf injury so Matt Noyen, a more junior referee who had already spent 80 minutes in the middle for Holden Cup, had to fill his place.

I’m not going to hang the officials on that decision, and if you picked it up live (which in excess of 99 per cent of people would not), then you deserve a crack as an NRL touchline. Just join the queue behind the guys who have been doing it for years in their local districts.

I’ll give you two examples: where I got it right, and I got it wrong.

In the second State of Origin game in 2011, New South Wales were trailing 8-0 when Luke Lewis scored his try from a Mitchell Pearce kick. I was on the spot to recommend ‘try’ to the referee and we gave no thought to referring it upstairs for review.

Lewis had overrun the previous play and found himself in a similar position to Stewart on Sunday. However, a quick play-the-ball and a deft kick from Pearce saw Lewis support the next play and score the try. The only person who noticed that Lewis was out of play was Russell Turner, who was the stand-by touch judge and mentioned it to the stand-by referee Tony Archer.

That was the only way I found out about my blunder in the change rooms. Even on review we looked at it and thought, “Oh well, nobody’s going to question that.”

Twelve months later and I was appointed to a Bulldogs game at ANZ Stadium. A Canterbury player went down injured near halfway and the clearing kick was sent downfield over his head. Everyone headed down to the north-east corner, where the Bulldogs winger picked the ball up and was tackled.

There was nothing unusual about that, as I took up my position on the 10-metre defensive line to rule on offside players. Then on play two or three Canterbury made a line break, with the fullback streaking up-field with nobody in support as he approached his opposite number in the last line of defence. He positioned the fullback front on and offloaded to – Josh Reynolds!

Where the hell did he come from? I was trying to think how the support player could jump out of the ground and be available like that – until I remembered the injured player on the previous set.

“Reynolds is out of play! Penalty!” was all I could say over the comms gear, without knowing for sure where he had been at the previous play-the-ball. The thoughts all happen in moments – from the pass to Reynolds being under the posts was five seconds at most.

I must have dropped off through my own self-doubt, as thankfully the video referee Sean Hampstead came across the airwaves with: “Yes, he’s out of play – penalty”. He’d saved my bacon.

I don’t know if video referee intervention is the answer to avoiding what happened on Sunday, but I would prefer to cop the error to having an additional video referee review.

For the life of me I can’t understand why the brilliant, individual Blake Austin try was referred only minutes previously. If we get to the stage where every try is checked, that will drive many fans away for good.