- Video
-
Club Roar
Captured a great grassroots sporting moment? We want to see it!Content Collections
The Roar Community
- Join
- Login
Opinion
At the centre of almost every rugby league conversation right now is the crackdown on contact made to the head or neck.
Many are very against this ‘new’ restriction on tackles – fearing that it is making the game soft, it may as well be touch footy, or that no one will want to watch it anymore.
I do not agree with any of those statements, especially if Sunday’s Manly-Parramatta game has anything to bring to the argument. It was a very brutal, hard-hitting, and exciting 80 minutes of footy.
This push to rid the game of head-high tackles and crusher tackles is so important. It needs to happen.
Not only for the safety of those playing now, but for those playing in the future, as well helping to secure the longevity of the game.
If it means that this year we break records in sin-bins, send offs and judiciary hearings, then so be it. I am all for it.
What I’m not all for, is the milking of penalties.
While this low act is nothing new, it is something that is going to happen more often if the NRL don’t jump on it. And I believe this has more of a threat of making the game ‘soft’ than the actual banning of the tackles themselves.
We’ve all seen it – a player goes down like he has been shot or will never be able to walk again. He stays down for long enough to get his team a penalty. Then gets up on his feet, gives a little wink – I’m looking at you, Paul Gallen – and then makes a miraculous recovery.
Now, I’m the kind of fan who gets angry at her own team for playing the ball really slow to help wind the clock down to secure the win. So, seeing players milk injuries to get penalties makes me furious.
I always scream at the TV: “Give him ten for terrible acting!”
Seriously, though, how good would that be? Players getting marched for a blatant milking. Between their teammate s, fans and mothers ripping into them for letting their side down, I bet they would all think twice before doing it again.
I have always been a strong believer that the level of injury should not determine the severity of punishment.
There are some absolute spectacular textbook tackles that can sideline players for a long time, and then there are illegal ones that don’t even leave a mark.
But both kinds of tackles will still be reviewed by the Bunker and (hopefully) the correct course of action will be taken. We don’t need our players to act like they are hurt or exaggerate the impact.
Yes, you heard me, Jarrod Wallace.
When a player jumps up celebrating after claiming a try, walking around so confident and sure of himself, the crowd goes absolutely bananas when the replay on the big screen shows he well and truly did not score. And he would have known that.
Andrew Voss has called more than one player a ‘fibber’ in his commentary for doing this. And then the player walks back to his team, looking very sheepish for getting called out in front of everyone.
Milkers should be embarrassed just as much, if not more.
Getting sin-binned or sent off for making a high tackle or a crusher tackle is not ‘making the game soft’. A player lying about the fact that he got hit with one is.
I just hope the players and the fans can understand the difference.