The Cowboys were defeated by the Storm 18-12 in Townsville on a record-breaking night for Cameron Smith.
Unfortunately, that will be overshadowed by a couple of controversial moments.
The first was the referees’ failure to hold up play as a result of a very serious injury to Nene Macdonald, when play continued and led to a Storm penalty that stretched the lead to a converted try.
The second was the final 30 seconds of play, when Felise Kaufusi got penalised for holding down a tackled player too long after held was call. A simple adjudication and the correct one, but it had the opposite effect of actually hindering the attacking team.
In the play itself, with approximately 30 seconds on the clock, the refs call held. Kaufusi deliberately lays over the tackled player Jordan McLean until a penalty is called with 24 seconds left.
The commentary team was flabbergasted he was not sin-binned for a professional foul.
(Photo by Mark Kolbe/Getty Images)
A penalty to a team that is six points down is of little consequence.
It took precious seconds off the clock – including the time it took the referee to blow the pee out of the whistle to give the penalty, make the movement to indicate why he blew the penalty in the most theatrical manner possible, and it took time for the Cowboys to take the ‘quick’ tap. Now only 20 seconds left.
Catching my drift? Ten of the 30 seconds gone without a ball being passed.
You can guarantee Kaufusi knew what he was doing and kudos to his game awareness.
It’s a penalty that would not be given away if you were only two points up or even.
The Cowboys failed to cross the line and the final siren blew in the middle of the play the ball. Game over.
So here is the conundrum. With seconds remaining, the defensive team knew that giving away a penalty was actually more beneficial to them than the attacking side.
Even if the ref rightly sent Kaufusi to the sin bin for a professional foul and had the presence of mind to stop the clock after he blew the penalty, that would still cost precious seconds.
Then restart the clock as the tap is taken. A new set of six – of which you would only have time for two or three tackles – is hardly reward for being on the receiving end of a deliberate infringement.
What do you do to ensure that in a similar scenario, the attacking team get full compensation for being infringed?
My solution is simple. The 80-minute full-time siren should no longer be the end of the game, it only signifies that the game ends at the end of that ‘phase’ of play.
‘Phase’ means the end of that set of six tackles, or if a new penalty is given, the end of that set.
Using tonight as an example, this is what I believe should have happened.
Kaufusi gives away the penalty at the 24-second mark. The referee blows time off and sin-bins Kaufusi for a professional foul.
The Cowboys receive a fresh set of six tackles, when time-on is blown as the player taps the ball play continues.
They continue to attack the Melbourne line, and any penalty given away by the Storm would mean a new set of six.
If the Cowboys have three tackles left when the full-time siren sounds, the clock keeps running.
Play continues until the ball is turned over or goes out of play, the Cowboys are tackled on the sixth, or the Cowboys score. The referee blows the full-time whistle when one of those things happens.
Giving the referees the power to end the game after current set concludes after the hooter would lead to a much fairer game from start to finish. I’d be happy for this to apply at half-time, too.
Consequences of giving away penalties remain consistent throughout the game, whether in the 29th minute or the 79th. The clock cannot be used by the team in front of the scoreboard to run the clock down in an illegal manner.
It may actually lead to more exciting finishes, and fans would appreciate a more standard conclusion to games, instead of finishing in the middle of the play the ball.
Papi Smurf
Roar Rookie
Australian Crawl were one of my favourite Australian bands in my late teens and early 20's but behind Cold Chisel who were my favourite Australian band.
BA Sports
Roar Guru
Yep, the best way to stop players giving away penalties in the final 30 seconds of a game to waste time - make sure you are ahead with 30 seconds to go.
jimmmy
Roar Rookie
Ben Hunt did not want to run the eighty metres. ,!
Brando Connor
Guest
I see what you are saying about not rewarding professional fouls. But I dont think the "you get the full set of six" is the way to go. It seems to big a change. Maybe a slight less extreme way to handle it would be in the event of a professional time wasting foul to reset the time remaining to what ever time the previous play of the ball was - and send the perpetrator off. But then you will be asking refs to guess if a penalty was deliberate time wasting or just a genuine(?!) penalty. On the ref not stopping play. It seems this the same thing you are talking about. The protocol thing is there to stop teams from faking injury (professional foul) to prevent the opposition from exploiting an advantageous field position / defenders being out of position. With hindsight you can say he should have stopped it. But if they weren't injured and the ref had stopped it, only for the two players to jump to their feet after a quick visit from the magic sponge, would you be saying "sorry Storm fans about the lost 2 points?"
Ron Norton
Roar Rookie
Typical. Melbourne get all the calls. It was a disgrace that play wasn't stopped for the Cowboys' double injury problem. Took the same referees about 2 seconds to decide to stop play when a Storm player copped a bleeding nose. Will be interesting to hear Graeme Annersley's take on these incidents. But we know what it will be don't we? The referees made the right call. Of course they did; it was Melbourne and referee Cameron told them what to do!!!!!!!
Simon G
Guest
It was smart by Melbourne but not how the game should be played. I'd suggest a penalty try for continuous deliberate penalties while defending your own line, that would stop the tactic quick smart.
Geoff from Bruce Stadium
Roar Rookie
ScoMo was probably getting down singing a few hymns somewhere in Cronulla! Don't forget that very few politicians live in Canberra - we just have to put up with them for a few months of the year.
Geoff from Bruce Stadium
Roar Rookie
Nice work Papi - James did a great version of Downhearted by the way. And nice reference to "Only a fool would say that" - great song by Steely Dan - one of my favourites of theirs back in the 70s. So much great music out there. Got to enjoy it while you can.
Geoff from Bruce Stadium
Roar Rookie
Just got back from John Bateman's Bay Baz - you wouldn't believe it but Unpublished Critics is my favourite of Aussie Crawls as well - I was going to yell out to James to sing it for his encore but he played Boys Light Up and that was it for the encore. He'd just played for 2 hours though which was pretty good value. I would have gladly volunteered to play slide air guitar on Unpublished Critics if they'd needed it. When I got home I found the CD and turned it up to 11 - great song.
Cat
Roar Guru
Which one was that? Both Cows tries came off of botched referee calls. The other was the Cam Smith 'knock on' that wasn't a knock on. Cows don't score a point without those wrong calls.
Cadfael
Roar Guru
It is in the rules for the referees to take this action but they so often don't. Mainly because you have commentators screaming that the penalties and/or sin bins ruin the game. It is the coaches telling their players to deliberately break the rules that spoil the game.
Rob
Guest
Just stirring TB. It was tongue in cheek about how the Ref just kept blowing the whistle until NSW scored.
Isaac Buatava
Roar Pro
I remembered those scenes from the 80s. Didnt know that was the reason why we have what we have.
The Barry
Roar Guru
Give what a rest? The author of this article is very much putting the result up for debate suggesting the Cowboys were “robbed” and “deserved” another set because 10 seconds were wasted. A team in the lead tried to wind down the clock in the last minute of the game. Wow what a shock, we better change the rules.
Snoop Bloggy blog
Roar Rookie
The Storm were the wrestle kings but intially giving away penalties as a defensive tactic is all Robinson and the Roosters. JWH probably has a higher penalty count inside their 20 than any team combined. And it’s not his fault or Robinson’s because it’s been allowed and rewarded under the referring. There’s no guilt in winning.
Snoop Bloggy blog
Roar Rookie
I strongly agree with that. Green has selected experienced plodders over talent too many times. Granville’s delivery has been shocking for long periods. Morgan’s being asked to played like Cronk when he suits playing a Lockyer type role. Hess hasn’t been punished for repeated laziness, Bowen has rarely delivered acceptable performances. TTM isn’t a fb and Clifford’s a much better half so has to be dropped.
Snoop Bloggy blog
Roar Rookie
Give it a rest Barry the result isn’t up for debate but things that happened in that game that are a negative trend across the game.
Snoop Bloggy blog
Roar Rookie
The tactics many teams use in defence to break the rules giving away a penalty that benefits their side is getting out of control. Robinson and the Roosters brought this into vogue around 2013 when the had lopsided penalty counts against them but had unheard points against. There’s been some effort to eradicate this but it’s not close to enough. Rugby don’t often get ahead of League with rule changes but they have a rule where if you knock down an attacking pass and don’t intercept cleanly it’s a penalty and sin bin. The train of thought behind the rule change is to harshly punish deliberately killing an attacking sides chances. League needs to regularly use the bin for intentionally giving away penalties, repeated infringements should result in a penalty try. I’m not talking any old 50-50 call but momentum killing penalties. Certain sides are notorious for giving away these penalties and it’s killing the spectacle as well as not allowing a fair contest.
Paul
Roar Guru
Isaac, you're looking for something which has never been a part of this game where every minute of the game is consistent. If truth be told, there's no way Kaufusi should have been placed in a position to be penalized if the refs were consistent with their application of the forward pass rule. The Cowboys would not have scored that late try and they would not have had a chance to win the game. The rules are simple and work well for this type of issue. The reality was, the Cowboys had ample opportunities to score a late try with the tackles they had, but were either not adventurous enough or simply not good enough to do so. They knew the rules when Kaufusi was penalized but they lacked urgency and creativity, so lost the game. I certainly didn't hear any complaints from Morgan or Greene after the game
Cadfael
Roar Guru
Agree with your comment on full time. Blowing full time as soon as the siren went only came into vogue in the 80s because of fans storming the field as soon as the siren went. Prior to this, if a scrum was ordered or a penalty given, these were allowed to be completed (including the tap after a penalty line kick). Even now we see players playing the ball, the siren sounds and the referee bolws the whistle.