Des Hasler's comments were out of line, but not by much

Des Hasler loves a cute one-liner for the media and he didn’t disappoint on Sunday with his not-so-subtle dig at the NRL.

He had a chip at the match officials for their policing of the 10 metres, accused the control referee of being “out of his depth”, and threatened to send NRL Head of Football Todd Greenberg a breach notice of his own for “misrepresentation”.

All of that was terrific for the cameras and microphones, but when you start poking a stick at a funnel web spider it won’t be long before you see it raise its front legs and expose its fangs.

The NRL responded by using its own venom – a $10,000 breach notice. Add to that the suspended fine Hasler received at the beginning of the year and the Bulldogs are left nursing a $20,000 bite.

Hasler’s crime? He criticised the referees and insulted the NRL’s 2IC.

It’s been outlawed since the start of the year and the fangs of the NRL are revealed every time a coach strays from the edict that stated coaches, players and club officials must not make any public comment on the performance of referees.

Last season ‘excessive criticism’ or ‘attacking the integrity’ of officials were the criteria for fines (and there were plenty of those handed out), but this season any comment is prohibited.

Hasler alluded to that in his famous ‘Voldemort’ press conference earlier this season, where he complained about the restriction on free speech and the inability to say anything positive or negative about the officials.

In principle I agree with him. Coaches should be able to say the referee got something wrong, that they were inept in their performance, or that the teams were stood back nearer to five metres than 10.

That’s fine – the NRL squad consists of officials who are big boys and girls and nobody takes much notice of what the coaches say. They all understand there is something else driving the criticism.

However, what cannot be tolerated is anyone accusing the officials of bias, corruption or being incapable of doing the job.

When Paul Gallen was heard on the referee’s microphone calling on him to “ref it fair” he overstepped that line. He was accusing the referee of not being impartial. He was implying the referee was harsher on his team than the opposition.

Sugarcoat it any way you like – Paul Gallen was calling the ref a cheat.

He should have been sin-binned and the NRL could have hit him with any further punishment it saw fit. Instead, he stayed on the park and we heard little more about it.

In the case of Hasler last weekend, he wasn’t accusing the officials of bias or cheating. He was much more circumspect than we have seen coaches previously and his criticism was confined to the game and its management. “Out of his depth” was not appropriate, but a comment about the 10 metres being more like five I can handle.

Insult one of the NRL’s hierarchy? Bang! $10,000 – you have a week to reply. Thanks for coming.

I just want the NRL to support everyone and demonstrate the leadership Greenberg spoke of at the start of the year.

One other contentious ruling – I’m not even going to describe the two video referee decisions for Titans’ tries because they were simply wrong – was in Melbourne on Saturday night.

The North Queensland Cowboys were trailing the Melbourne Storm 8-0 just before halftime when they split the Storm defence on the 30-metre line and executed a string of passes to support players to score.

I was excited to see the try awarded as it was a reward for brilliant, innovative play inside a team’s own half and the game was then much more of a contest.

So I was surprised referee Ben Cummins refereed his live decision of ‘try’ upstairs to check for obstruction.

Thankfully his pocket ref or touch judge had noticed the contact Gavin Cooper made on Cooper Cronk. As soon as I saw the first replay – as much as I wanted the decision to stand – I knew it would be overruled and the Cowboys penalised for obstruction.

The Cowboys’ second rower Cooper had barrelled Cronk over and the North Queenslanders immediately exploited the gap.

It was an open-and-shut case until Paul Green mentioned it after full time and – choosing his words carefully – lamented what a costly decision it was.

I’m happy to hear his criticism as long as he is taken to task when he is proven wrong.

I wanted to confirm what I first thought about the decision by checking the highlights to see it again. Where did I go? To the NRL website to check the official highlights.

I got to see Cameron Smith kick a penalty goal, a Cowboys player take a kick one-handed, Kevin Proctor ground an attacking kick on the dead ball line, a Storm player spun around in a tackle and into touch – all lovely.

But where was the 70-metre line break that was called back and penalised, preventing a Cowboys try?

*crickets*

It was erased from NRL.com history like it never happened. So not only does the game deny the coaches a comment on the referees, it removes a key moment from the video record because it was contentious. And this ruling was correct!

It was the same story for the breach notice Hasler received. I checked the NRL website on Tuesday night for the official statement so that I could see what the exact misdemeanour was. I searched in the news section, the Bulldogs’ club section, and the media release section. It’s not on the official Bulldogs site either. I couldn’t find it anywhere.

Anyway, I hope Des doesn’t wind back any of his colourful expressions too far. Having a coach speak in more than stodgy clichés is too valuable to the game.

Des is thought of surprisingly fondly within the NRL referees group for his expression ‘empathy’. He addressed the referees one day and asked them to show some “empathy” for the players – which the referees all interpreted as ‘let them bend the rules’.

I could see that from his early days as a coach at Manly. When he was the NSW Cup coach at the Sea Eagles, Hasler would also act at the trainer for their Peter Sharp-coached NRL side on game day.

Nobody spent more time on the field in their capacity as trainer than Des. He was known as Manly’s 18th man.

It was a precursor of what we see now with trainers loitering behind their players for the whole attacking set (it drives many fans nuts – and you can count me and fellow Roar Expert Tim Gore among them). This was just his way of bending the rules.

One Saturday night at Brookvale in 2003 I was acting as an interchange official for Manly versus Cronulla. I had acted as a touch judge for the previous NSW Cup game, and in those years we did interchange for first grade afterwards.

Des had been on the park for as long as the halfback (as usual) when a Manly player was hit in a very solid tackle, and the Sharks players sand-bagged the ball carrier afterwards in a show of dominance.

The player was injured and it became apparent that they would need to replace him. Des was running between their team’s manager, Alex Ross, and the players on the park, giving instructions.

I was standing next to Alex as the replays came up on the screen and could hear the conversation on the walkie-talkie as it went back and forth from the coach to the bench.

After the first replay Alex asked me: “What do you reckon? Will we get a free interchange for that?”

I replied: “Nah, that’s got him hard, but it’s not illegal. I don’t think they’ll put it on report, but we’ll wait for the signal from the ref.”

The walkie-talkie crackled into life as the coach digested what he’s seen on the replay. “Get the free interchange card – we’ll put [insert player’s name because I can’t remember] on and he can play on the right edge.”

Alex gave me a look that betrayed what he was about to say to the boss. “They’re not going to put it on report.”

A further replay appeared that showed shoulder-to-shoulder contact and what looked like a head clash.

The walkie-talkie spoke again: “What do you mean? He’s got him in the head!”

Alex looked at me again and I said quietly: “It’s a head clash – you can’t penalise that.”

The information was relayed to the grandstand: “It’s a head clash – it won’t be penalised.”

“What – ughhhh – well what about the flop!?”

Again a look, and again I shook my head to indicate there was nothing illegal about it.

“No, they’re saying there’s nothing wrong with that.”

Coach Sharp was, as the great Manly prop used to say, flabbergasted.

“Alex – get away from that dickhead!”

The walkie-talkie and its owner moved swiftly downfield.

I didn’t hear any more from Peter Sharp that night, and at the end of the season he was sacked, with Des Hasler appointed as the first-grade coach.

But I’ll never forget that conversation. It showed me that in rugby league you never know how much venom you’ll get or where it will come from.