- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
“Ahh, can you smell that?” Mick Stone was cajoling the NRL’s inaugural second tier squad of officials in September 2006.
“It’s the finals – and they’re here.”
That quote (as I remember it) reminds those who heard it of the sunny mornings as the days get longer, a warmer afternoon breeze, and most importantly the chance to officiate the finals of various grades as referees, touch judges and in-goal judges on the best rugby league grounds in the country.
For those guys running in the State Cup competitions, the National Youth Competition, and all the other semi-professional competitions this offers the opportunity to showcase their talents in the hope of being in the next grade higher in 2016.
For me that smell is now of bacon and eggs at junior footy grounds, smelly little kid team jumpers to be washed in Napisan to be ready for next year.
In fact I was at the Mounties Sportsground a few weeks ago (where I was put in an all too precarious position for a retired match official) of choosing between the bacon and egg roll or the box of hot chips for breakfast.
I knew I shouldn’t be eating either of them, yet still my mind oscillated between the two options. I knew the rolls are pricey, but the Mounties barbecue man is generous with the bacon and they include two eggs. Two eggs! But the hot chips being served to the 10-year-old in front of me did smell of delicious, oily, salty, goodness.
I’d made up my mind – with the strength of my conviction as a former semi-professional athlete I wouldn’t be choosing between them at all.
“I’ll have a bacon and egg roll and a box of hot chips please,” I announced to one of the two volunteer canteen ladies there.
“Do you want chicken salt with that?”
“One hundred per cent,” I replied.
And with that I had secured a 9am feast of bacon, eggs and chips. Hearty is not the word!
By the time I had finished the roll and was into the chips I needed something to drink to help me finish the banquet. I headed over to the canteen again for the next important choice – Coke or Pepsi.
“I’ll have a can of Pepsi please,” I asked the first canteen lady.
As she reached for the fridge a man next to me greeted the second lady by name and asked for a box of chips with gravy.
The Homer Simpson light went off in my head. Gravy, eh?
“I wish I’d known you had gravy or I might have had some.”
The man next to me – obviously a Saturday morning regular, judging by both his girth and his confidence – piped up: “Oh, yes – we always have gravy down here!”
I lamented my missed opportunity. I turned around to where my family was sitting and forlornly looked on as my chips were steadily being pilfered by my children.
“You can still have some if you like,” the second canteen lady said.
“Yeah but I’ve already bought my chips.”
“No charge,” she enthused. “I’ll put it in a cup for you.”
And in that one lashing you can see why I’m not running around in 2015.
My dad has even said to me: “Son, you’re going to have to run around the park or do some laps of the pool.”
I have a consistent reply though.
“Leave me alone, dad. I’m in my Gap Year.”
Which is a stark contrast to previous years, of course.
Up until this year I have been under the microscope of the NRL’s referees’ department because I’ve never enjoyed training as much as the other guys and I was never able to meet the targets of weight or skin fold scores.
All the officials appointed this weekend have continued that discipline all season and been rewarded with a Week 1 finals appointment.
They have had fitness tests through the pre-Christmas and pre-season training blocks, they have had regular skin fold testing on calipers, and they have had to endure the sort of training that NRL teams would do, often while looking at a video screen to come up with a decision under incredible fatigue.
When I was running – and I expect it is still the same – the core building blocks of performance were fitness, laws knowledge, communication, and confidence. This was supplemented with what you might describe as the ‘one-percenters’, which is all the work in preparation and recovery through the week that you don’t see in the 80 minutes on game day.
(I always said I was great at the one percenters: like remembering my boots; or having beer already in the fridge at home because I’d finish too late to beat the 10pm takeaway lockout).
The officials this week have proven to be the most consistent and most accurate in decisions through the course of 26 rounds and have demonstrated they at the top of an elite group.
However, while there are four games this week there are only two next week, meaning half the officials are going to be disappointed next Tuesday.
So there is a certain amount of pressure on the guys coming from different sources.
Firstly, they have earned the right to be there so they need to perform to justify it to their coaches and everyone else. Secondly, they are feeling the heat from their colleagues who all want to be there in the first week of October.
But most importantly they feel the pressure to get the job done because they have a personal pride in representing all the men, women, boys and girls who run out onto local parks every weekend. We’re all referees and we’re represented by the best within that fraternity.
The referees, touch judges and video referees are ranked going into the weekend so the best officials are appointed to the best game (usually an elimination match, because it has the most riding on it). That is balanced with the needs of the broadcasters, where the top officials also need to be on the most-viewed match, which is almost always the Friday night.
For that reason I don’t know who is ranked higher than whom, with the only guarantee that the four controlling referees – Ben Cummins, Jared Maxwell, Gerard Sutton and Matt Cecchin – are ranked one to four, although not necessarily in that order.
Sutton controlled all three State of Origin matches, always displays good form for the finals, and is on an elimination game, so he might still be the one to catch.
As for the assistant refs and the touchies, I have no idea. I’m surprised Ashley Klein is filling an assist role, but there are only four positions and when you award a penalty and then change your mind – breaking a golden rule of refereeing, as he did on Sunday night – then that’s enough to slip behind the guy ranked below you.
However he is also video referee for an elimination game, so that might be his path to the grand final.
So in saying all that, sometimes it doesn’t matter where you’re ranked going into the first finals weekend. It all depends on what happens in your 80 minutes, and even then it might be out of your control.
Every Cowboys and Sharks fan remembers the 2013 finals series for the ‘seventh tackle try’. The officials on that game went very well in every area of the game – except the ‘team’ committed a monumental blunder.
Unfortunately that not only meant the end of the season for the referee counting the tackles at the time, but everyone else aboard the Townsville Titanic couldn’t get to a lifeboat either.
The two referees, both touch judges and both video referees were dumped. After that match they had nothing to look forward to but pre-season training.
So enjoy the footy this weekend, and remember as much as the players are putting everything into getting to Week 2, you can guarantee the officials are as well.
Reckon you can pick the winning team? Build your own dream team with Draftstars daily fantasy and compete on any match. For great odds on the NRL head on over to PlayUp. Imagine what you could be buying instead. Set a deposit limit.