jirskyr
Well-known member
@ said:@ said:@ said:@ said:Yes, the reffing has declined. The biggest mistake in this games history in regards to refs came about with Bill Harrigan and his "feel for the game" and own interpretation of rules.
There's a book, it has all the rules of Rugby League in it. The writing is in black ink, the background is white. There is no grey. If referees, ref to the rules, then how can you make a mistake? Funny how in Rugby, the ball still gets put in the middle of the scrum, because if you don't put it in the middle, it's a friggin penalty!!! Thats what it says in the rule book. Want to tidy up the play the balls in our game? Then penalise players who don't play the ball correctly. There has been too much emphasis on letting the game flow, and it's come at the expense of enforcing the rules. If there's no rules or they aren't enforced you have anarchy and a power struggle and unfortunately the players and coaches have had the upper hand in that struggle for quite sometime.
The refs are there to make sure the game is played according to the rules, if they aren't going to enforce them then we don't require refs, it's that simple really.
Great post F1,rules are rules they outline and define our game,changing them will inevitably change the original game to something else under its banner..
No offence but you want the game to be reffed more like rugby? Please no.
If you blow the pea out of the whistle the game will be worse off than what we have now. I honestly feel rugby is a joke for exactly that reason.
No i want the game to be reffed like Rugby League. I want it to be reffed according to the rules.
Look at line dropouts. How many times is the dropout taken in front of the goal line? Its not a major thing, but somebody ( i think maybe it was Reynolds) got penalised for it because it was "too far" passed the line. Thats the correct call as the dropout needs to be taken from on or behind the tryline. The issue of course comes from what is my interpretation of "too far" in front of the line as opposed to yours? Straight away we have inconsistency from one ref to the next, and thats what kills this game. If the rule was enforced it is black and white and the dropout is taken in front of the goal line it's a penalty EVERY time, not just when it's "too far" in someones opinion.
OK but what you are describing is too technical and I believe it would be to the detriment of the game.
I don't mean reffing to union rules, I meant reffing all aspects of the game with extreme technicality, the way rugby does. Refs in rugby hold way too much power and penalties are far too important in the context of the match. I just can't understand a code where a team can win simply by having a sharp shooter like Johnny Wilkins to slot penalties from anywhere inside the half.
So fair enough you can heavily police drop-outs. And you can bring back every tap or touch-finder that isn't taken exactly on the mark. You can have both refs stringently penalising anyone with a foot offside at the kickoff. You can penalise players for not touching the footy with their foot in the PTB, and you can change the rule back to force all penalty taps to be taken with a released football.
But seriously what kind of game would that be to watch? People already complain about the influence of the refs in the games, and you are advocating they have more influence and police more heavily.
There's a reason why State of Origin is so good - not just because of the quality of the teams, but because the refs give fairly wide latitude on rule interpretations. The matches are better for it. Now I don't think you can rule 26 rounds of club matches like Origin, there'd be too much leeway over a whole season, but I believe the less the refs are forced to blow penalties and make calls on things that have minimal impact on the match, the better the game is.