Another week, another referee error
Dan Nicholls
– July 22, 2015
SOURCE : Zero Tackle .
Tony Archer has come out and admitted that his referees were incorrect in disallowing Andrew Fifita a try in the closing minute of the Sharks/Raiders clash on Saturday afternoon.
If the try was to be disallowed due to a knock on, it should have been awarded as a penalty try, according to the referee’s boss.
A Valentine Holmes field goal luckily saved the officials blushes and handed the Sharks a victory they were denied minutes earlier.
Should Canberra have won the match, would Archer have come out and said what he did?
If so, how would telling Sharks fans that they were robbed of victory have helped them?
Canberra walk away with two competition points, but the referee boss comes out and says the try that everyone in the world except the one person with the opinion that counts, thought was a try.
How about instead of apologising for incorrect decisions after the fact we implement steps to ensure these errors don’t happen?
I want to make it very clear that I’m not talking 50/50 calls or opinion. Sometimes it takes three replays for fans to discover an error made by referees made in a split second.
This is about an error made by an official who blatantly disregarded the rules.
The referees sent the decision up as a TRY. The rule states there must be conclusive evidence to overturn the on-field decision.
Ignoring the absolute insanity of the rule, which is another argument for another day, there was ZERO conclusive evidence to over-turn the on-field decision.
That is not my opinion … that is the rule.
Shayne Hayne ignored the rule and took the safe option. If the decision had gone up as a no try, then it wouldn’t have been given. It wasn’t 100% grounded, there was doubt.
That’s how the ridiculous rule is, but referees do not get to pick and choose which rule they follow.
Hayne’s punishment?
An all-expenses paid trip to the heated Melbourne video referee box for a super important clash between the Storm and the Dragons.
How do I sign up to become a video referee? If that’s a punishment for an error that could have cost a team their finals footy chances, I wonder what they do to reward good performance?
If it sounds like I’m a little hot under the collar, it is because I am.
I LOATHE seeing the referee blamed for results, it drives me crazy. Players, coaches and fans throw the officials under the bus for lop-sided penalty accounts instead of working on their own discipline.
It’s so much easier to call #RefsFault (check the hashtag on twitter for some hilarious reactions), than it is to accept defeat.
Only a Valentine Holmes field goal stopped Saturday afternoon from erupting into another media storm of referee incompetence.
Decisions on-field that are incorrect I can cop.
Someone having 25 views of something and then ignoring all evidence, and the rules they are paid to uphold, to render a verdict that 99.5% of the non-Raider supporting members of Rugby League fans couldn’t believe …
Should have gone to specsavers.
