Via Courier Mail
Wests Tigers officials have been granted an audience with ARL Commission chair Peter V’landys and NRL chief executive Andrew Abdo as they intensify efforts to reverse the result of their controversial loss to North Queensland.
News Corp understands that NRL head of football Graham Annesley wrote to Tigers chair Lee Hagipantelis over the weekend offering the club the opportunity to sit down with the game’s foremost powerbrokers this week.
It shapes the Tigers’ final and most important fling as they look to convince key officials that they were robbed of two points in their loss to North Queensland just over a week ago.
V’landys and Abdo will head into the meeting armed with a report that has been completed by the NRL — the pair spent the weekend digesting its contents following the Tigers’ controversial loss to the Cowboys, which was decided by a Valentine Holmes penalty goal when the 80 minutes had expired.
That report holds the key to the Tigers’ hopes of convincing the ARL Commission to take their protests seriously. The Tigers have hired a high-powered lawyer Yaseen Shariff SC — part of Jack de Belin’s legal team in his quest to overturn the no-fault stand down rule — to act on their behalf.
The ARL Commission has some legal muscle of their own. Alan Sullivan QC became a commissioner in February and it seems hard to believe that V’landys and Abdo won’t have enlisted his advice to help them navigate the current situation involving the Tigers.
Sullivan was on the other side of the courtroom to Shariff during the De Belin saga, acting on behalf of the game.
At the heart of the dispute is the decision in the final seconds to award a penalty to the Cowboys that allowed him to kick a penalty goal and win the game in Townsville.
The Tigers have been on the warpath ever since as they attempt to convince the ARL Commission to give them the two points, a decision that would no doubt prompt the Cowboys to explore legal action of their own given they are entrenched in the top four and harbour an outside hope of reeling in Penrith to win the minor premiership.