Bunker ruling on forward passes

[Cultured_Bogan]

They adjudicate on everything else, they manage to work out knock ons (not to a 100% strike rate either might I add,) so why would they not grasp forward passes with similar accuracy?

Every third or fourth pass out of dummy half is forward now, they may as well rename the position quarterback.

 

[Fade_To_Black]

Deary me this game goes around in circles… we stopped allowing video refs to rule on forward passes years ago because it became a farce. Even on replay it is so difficult to determine whether or not a pass went forward out of the hands or if it just went forward through momentum. The adjudication would be so inconsistent that fans would be up in arms (as they were before), and the fans would be pleading to take the decision out of the bunker's hands (and the circle of rugby league continues).

I'd suggest that if a touch judge or ref cannot identify a pass that has gone 4 or 5 metres forward (many times they have the 10 metre increment lines on the field as a distinct reference point) then they probably aren't suitable for their job and should also be prohibited from driving.
Can live with a touch and go pass being ruled on either way but some of the ones they miss ñowadays are embarrassing and demonstrate complete incompetence.

 

[Fade_To_Black]

Deary me this game goes around in circles… we stopped allowing video refs to rule on forward passes years ago because it became a farce. Even on replay it is so difficult to determine whether or not a pass went forward out of the hands or if it just went forward through momentum. The adjudication would be so inconsistent that fans would be up in arms (as they were before), and the fans would be pleading to take the decision out of the bunker's hands (and the circle of rugby league continues).

They call a player offside from a kick by 1/2 a cm if they can line that up by eye surely they can get 3m forward passes right, I know it's a different kettle of fish with objects moving and momentum but I think the majority is OK with if it looks and sounds and walks like a duck its a duck.
We put up with knock backs being called knick ons every game.

I'm happy for the video ref to watch it in normal speed, have 2 looks and if it looks like a forward pass call it, I understand there's going to be tough calls line ball calls that we disagree with but I think we could live with that.

There are some passes that on first look a blind man can see they're forward, I'm happy if we can just get those right.

Steve-o is right, when they first ruled on forward passes with video ref it was a dog's breakfast.

I think you underestimate what is a "line-ball" forward pass or not. 5m forward passes are fine, we can all see those, but really you'd expect 95% of those types of passes to be called back by on-field refs. But when you are talking 1-2m forward, it becomes a real grey area and the reason they don't use the video is because they can't - it doesn't work.

You can't video ref on only some forward passes, you'd have to send them all upstairs if they were close. And because what constitutes a "close" pass decision actually affects a wide number of passes, many calls would be close; you'd be going upstairs all the time and asking the video to constantly make 50/50 decisions on tough line-ball calls.

It's not like knock-ons or offsides - either he touched it or he didn't; either his feet are behind the kicker on a 2D plane or they aren't. Forward passes are something entirely different, and although you've said that you appreciate that, the idea that a video ref can take 2 looks at normal speed and call a pass forward - tells me you don't appreciate it at all.

Yes we can all see 5-metre forward passes when they occur but many refs and touchies for some unexscuseable reason cannot. And when these laughable howlers are missed on-field but shown up in all their pathetic glory via the replays provided, the bunker does not have the ability to change the decision. That is farcical whichever way you look at it.

 

[jirskyr]

They adjudicate on everything else, they manage to work out knock ons (not to a 100% strike rate either might I add,) so why would they not grasp forward passes with similar accuracy?

Every third or fourth pass out of dummy half is forward now, they may as well rename the position quarterback.

For the Nth time - they can't grasp forward passes because forward passes are lateral movements in 3 dimensions plus time - you need cameras and software capable of making a 3-dimensional assessment of the entire playing volume (~116m long, ~70m wide and ~10 m high) then determining whether passes go forward relative to the passer - it just can't be done with the technology they have. You can't use the elevated centre-fixed isometric views we have on telly, front-on views are useless, and side-on views are only workable if there is a camera parallel with the football 100% of the time, which there isn't (and even if there was, it wouldn't take into account the elevation of a pass).

I provide this link every time:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=box08lq9ylg

Knock-ons are not the same - it's only a matter of did he touch it and did it go forward to the ground or the opposition? You can argue that 99% of touches are correctly observed, the only grey area really being did the knock "go forward'. In that respect, you are talking very small movements of the ball, some 1-2m max in normal circumstances, with an error touch and the following landing. The ball does not typically transfer from one player to another on his team.

So taking your point, that there isn't a 100% consensus on video knock-ons, imagine how much worse it is when you apply that grey area "did it go forward?" to passes, of which there are hundreds (thousands?) per match and very many of them with a wide grey area of interpretation - passes covering 3-15 metres across and +/- 3-4m forward/backwards.

In fact don't imagine it, cast your mind back circa 1996 when they did rule on forward passes and it was pure pot luck. They didn't remove forward passes from the video ref for the fun of it, they removed it because it was proven to not be consistently reviewable by someone on video.

You would think, that with the video bunker and the amount of decisions that do get sent for video review, they'd send up forward passes if there wasn't some strong disincentive to do so. Some people have the logic all backwards - they don't send up forward passes precisely because they can't review them just like they do knock-ons or offsides. They aren't doing it for the spite or fear of it - would be the first time in a long while that anyone would have accused the refs or the bunker from under-adjudicating a match!

 

[jirskyr]

Deary me this game goes around in circles… we stopped allowing video refs to rule on forward passes years ago because it became a farce. Even on replay it is so difficult to determine whether or not a pass went forward out of the hands or if it just went forward through momentum. The adjudication would be so inconsistent that fans would be up in arms (as they were before), and the fans would be pleading to take the decision out of the bunker's hands (and the circle of rugby league continues).

They call a player offside from a kick by 1/2 a cm if they can line that up by eye surely they can get 3m forward passes right, I know it's a different kettle of fish with objects moving and momentum but I think the majority is OK with if it looks and sounds and walks like a duck its a duck.
We put up with knock backs being called knick ons every game.

I'm happy for the video ref to watch it in normal speed, have 2 looks and if it looks like a forward pass call it, I understand there's going to be tough calls line ball calls that we disagree with but I think we could live with that.

There are some passes that on first look a blind man can see they're forward, I'm happy if we can just get those right.

Steve-o is right, when they first ruled on forward passes with video ref it was a dog's breakfast.

I think you underestimate what is a "line-ball" forward pass or not. 5m forward passes are fine, we can all see those, but really you'd expect 95% of those types of passes to be called back by on-field refs. But when you are talking 1-2m forward, it becomes a real grey area and the reason they don't use the video is because they can't - it doesn't work.

You can't video ref on only some forward passes, you'd have to send them all upstairs if they were close. And because what constitutes a "close" pass decision actually affects a wide number of passes, many calls would be close; you'd be going upstairs all the time and asking the video to constantly make 50/50 decisions on tough line-ball calls.

It's not like knock-ons or offsides - either he touched it or he didn't; either his feet are behind the kicker on a 2D plane or they aren't. Forward passes are something entirely different, and although you've said that you appreciate that, the idea that a video ref can take 2 looks at normal speed and call a pass forward - tells me you don't appreciate it at all.

Yes we can all see 5-metre forward passes when they occur but many refs and touchies for some unexscuseable reason cannot. And when these laughable howlers are missed on-field but shown up in all their pathetic glory via the replays provided, the bunker does not have the ability to change the decision. That is farcical whichever way you look at it.

Doesn't it tell you that forward passes are pretty hard to rule on, if a person standing on the sideline can't see all the "obvious" ones?

I personally think refs are not in the best position to call it, as they are rarely in line with a passed football - i.e. they are usually in front of or behind the play. Touchies should pick up the sideline ones, but touchies are moving relative to the football and they have a different view than we do on TV, because the players and football are moving also - relative motion makes for a different observed reality.

And touchies can't really pick up all the mid-field forward passes easily because of the distance to the football, some 34 metres if it's right in centre-field. And when those passes occur from DH, one of the touchies is almost always unsighted - because the pass view is blocked by the dummy half.

The only way they could do it properly is to put GPS in the football, or buy a hawkeye camera and installations for every ground (which I don't believe is possible at all grounds, because the camera needs an aerial component).

 

[Cultured_Bogan]

They adjudicate on everything else, they manage to work out knock ons (not to a 100% strike rate either might I add,) so why would they not grasp forward passes with similar accuracy?

Every third or fourth pass out of dummy half is forward now, they may as well rename the position quarterback.

For the Nth time - they can't grasp forward passes because forward passes are lateral movements in 3 dimensions plus time - you need cameras and software capable of making a 3-dimensional assessment of the entire playing volume (~116m long, ~70m wide and ~10 m high) then determining whether passes go forward relative to the passer - it just can't be done with the technology they have. You can't use the elevated centre-fixed isometric views we have on telly, front-on views are useless, and side-on views are only workable if there is a camera parallel with the football 100% of the time, which there isn't (and even if there was, it wouldn't take into account the elevation of a pass).

I provide this link every time:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=box08lq9ylg

Knock-ons are not the same - it's only a matter of did he touch it and did it go forward to the ground or the opposition? You can argue that 99% of touches are correctly observed, the only grey area really being did the knock "go forward'. In that respect, you are talking very small movements of the ball, some 1-2m max in normal circumstances, with an error touch and the following landing. The ball does not typically transfer from one player to another on his team.

So taking your point, that there isn't a 100% consensus on video knock-ons, imagine how much worse it is when you apply that grey area "did it go forward?" to passes, of which there are hundreds (thousands?) per match and very many of them with a wide grey area of interpretation - passes covering 3-15 metres across and +/- 3-4m forward/backwards.

In fact don't imagine it, cast your mind back circa 1996 when they did rule on forward passes and it was pure pot luck. They didn't remove forward passes from the video ref for the fun of it, they removed it because it was proven to not be consistently reviewable by someone on video.

You would think, that with the video bunker and the amount of decisions that do get sent for video review, they'd send up forward passes if there wasn't some strong disincentive to do so. Some people have the logic all backwards - they don't send up forward passes precisely because they can't review them just like they do knock-ons or offsides. They aren't doing it for the spite or fear of it - would be the first time in a long while that anyone would have accused the refs or the bunker from under-adjudicating a match!

I take your points, and I am well aware of the concept of momentum.

I answered yes in the context that it is the only rule that they cannot officiate on. Seems a little silly they can call on everything sans one rule. And to be fair, even if they call a handful right a game, they would already be in front of the on field field referees where you just about have to lob a Tom Brady special to be called on it.

If it were up to me the bunker would be gone, and so would the second referee. No earpieces, nothing. Just allow the one man to call the game for 80 minutes without anyone in his ear.

 

[barra]

We had a big conversation about this earlier in the year - they don't have the technology to rule on forward passes.

You can't just draw a line on the field, you need 3-dimensional data, which isn't set up in league. Something like Hawkeye maybe be able to do it, like it does for LBWs in cricket, but that's a camera system watching over a rectangle only 22 yards x 2 metres.

One suggestion from ~2015 was that the best option would be to have a GPS chip inside the ball, so the ball itself could tell you if it traveled forward.

Agree but we rule if a player knocks a ball on in the NRL even when we don't use technology available hotspot etc.

I think they could rule on blatant forward passes for now.

Maybe we will end up like cricket and the ball starts flashing if it goes forward 😱pen_mouth:

Ball technology is the direction it should be going. The only way to adjudicate whether the ball goes forward is by using GPS which measures the forward speed of the ball before it gets passed. If they can supplement satellite GPS somehow, it would cure both forward passes and even knock-ons if they wanted it to. In fact any time the ball goes in a forward direction there would be black/white data on it.

An alert comes on in the bunker and it gets called. It could even happen automatically via the bunker without human intervention. No more shay dummy-half passes either, that would get the ball carrier a bit deeper!

Technology and programming is pretty good these days. Surely it's only a matter of time?

 

[Russell]

The best way to go in my opinion…

One referee, no bunker and any ball that is caught in front of the spot where it is thrown is forward.

Worked for almost 100 years - it will work again.

 

[hobbo]

The best way to go in my opinion…

One referee, no bunker and any ball that is caught in front of the spot where it is thrown is forward.

Worked for almost 100 years - it will work again.

Agree ..
But that would be too logical for the NRL to adopt .
Greenberg loves his bunker more than Hitler loved his !

 

[Cairnstigers]

Of course they should rule on forward passes if it is in the play that a try is scored
Why not
As long as it is a clear cut decision

No one wants to loose a game on a forward pass
I hate seeing a try awarded on a forward pass and it frustrates me more than having to wait the extra 2 minutes to get it right
If it's not clear then award the try
It would be the same rule for all teams
No team should be ripped off because a no try is awarded a try
Except Sharks and Roosters

 

[mike]

No no no no no. You can’t tell from the various camera angles. You can’t draw a line across and detmine how the ball left the hands. The Bunker would get this wrong more times than they get it right.

 

[innsaneink]

The best way to go in my opinion…

One referee, no bunker and any ball that is caught in front of the spot where it is thrown is forward.

Worked for almost 100 years - it will work again.

:brick: :brick: :brick:

It would only work if we adopt the netball rule of catching the ball, stopping, then passing the ball

 

[jirskyr]

The best way to go in my opinion…

One referee, no bunker and any ball that is caught in front of the spot where it is thrown is forward.

Worked for almost 100 years - it will work again.

Agree ..
But that would be too logical for the NRL to adopt .
Greenberg loves his bunker more than Hitler loved his !

Watch the youtube video I posted earlier Russ. And then sit down this weekend and watch football for a few hours, count the number of footballs that get passed backwards but caught in front of where the ball left the hands - you'd be surprised.

The telling one in the video is if you run forward and throw the ball backwards over your head, the bloke behind you will catch it in front of where you threw it. So by your rule it's a forward pass.

Also how would the ref be deciding where the player was standing when it was thrown, considering all the players are more or less in constant motion?

The resolute lack of understanding of physics in this thread makes my head explode.

 

[Fade_To_Black]

The best way to go in my opinion…

One referee, no bunker and any ball that is caught in front of the spot where it is thrown is forward.

Worked for almost 100 years - it will work again.

Agree ..
But that would be too logical for the NRL to adopt .
Greenberg loves his bunker more than Hitler loved his !

:roll

Sadly Adolf would probably be more trustworthy than Toddy G.

 

[hobbo]

The best way to go in my opinion…

One referee, no bunker and any ball that is caught in front of the spot where it is thrown is forward.

Worked for almost 100 years - it will work again.

Agree ..
But that would be too logical for the NRL to adopt .
Greenberg loves his bunker more than Hitler loved his !

:roll

Sadly Adolf would probably be more trustworthy than Toddy G.

True :laughing:

 

[Marshall_magic]

From what I've heard the reason this doesn't happen is because the camera's used have convex lenses to enhance the focus across the field, distorting the natural image which may affect how a pass looks. If you look at the lines across the field on TV, they never look straight, they always seem a little wavy. If this is the case then I am happy for them not to rule, but I get the sense with the ref making a call now and the bunker double checking it I think it could be worth a try.

That said I kind of wish decisions could be made and we get on with the game, rather than stopping the game to over analyse everything.

 

[TIGER]

The game is being ruled by two referees, two touch judges and the bunker. The decisions are now more frustrating and time wasting then they have ever been. Having the bunkerr call on every suspicious forward pass would only add to the current time wasting and frustration.

I'm talking only when the on field ref has gone upstairs to check a possible try and there's a blatant forward pass in the play.
At this point the video ref sees it and says to himself "well there's a 2m forward pass there that I can't say anything about" and everybody at the game watching the replay and at home is pulling their hair out complaining how ridiculous it is that everybody including the on field ref can't call what they've just seen.

 

[Harvey]

I said no. It will bring another area of "interpretation" for them to get wrong.

I would let them rule on blatant forward passes, but who decides what is blatant.

 

[Tarl]

Captains Challenge. If they think the ball was forward and missed by the refs the Captain can challenge.

Plus NRL to define forward pass, forward out of the hands, momentum drift OK.

Probably not going to happen though…

 

[69-05-41]

Yes, but only for tries scored against the Broncos