Referees continue to dent the NRL's integrity

Another week of sport goes by and the National Rugby League still find a way to lure in the headlines for the wrong reasons. 

This time around it is on the distasteful conduct of Canterbury Bankstown Bulldogs fans on display at the conclusion of South Sydney Rabbitohs versus Bulldogs at ANZ Stadium last Friday night. 

After the game water bottle missiles were launched at officials as they walked down the tunnel with one official being hospitalised as a result. 

I do not want to discuss the Adam Reynolds and James Graham incident on the field just yet, but rather the performance of NRL referees that continually come under question week in week out. 

The relationship between players and the referees is getting worse, and worse each week.

Yes, the behaviour of Bulldogs fans was deplorable. 

The club should be fined appropriately and its fans should be banned from attending game(s), similar to what they do for some European soccer teams overseas.  

They call it a ‘ghost’ fixture where the home fans are forbidden from watching their team from inside the stadium as a result of discreditable conduct that a small minority of Bulldogs fans similarly demonstrated last week.

As a tragic fan of soccer in Europe, I am under the impression that this method works most of the time.

Aside from this, I’d still rather talk about how or if we can keep defending rugby league referees.

I must say that there is not another sport in Australia where officials cop it so much from the media and fans alike. 

But I have to say, it is for good reason. 

99% of spectators at first grade or junior games can respect a referee’s decision while also understanding that it’s ‘just a game’, and there is no issue. 

However I do not agree that half the crowd resents the referee just for ‘doing their best.’ 

The problem in first grade is that their best is not good enough. 

Week after week they make extremely poor decisions and there is no accountability whatsoever. 

I don’t know if it’s the referee’s being not fit enough, or lacking knowledge of the rules, or even the NRL’s fault for changing the rules frequently. 

Generally spectators will accept 50/50 decisions going against, even crucial ones, when they’re made in the ‘heat of the moment’ for e.g. State of Origin. 

Yes, they will boo, jeer, and be disappointed – that’s normal. 

But as a Newcastle Knights fan, I presume that these dud calls usually even themselves out over the season – take the English Premier League for example. 

But in the NRL, there are constant terrible decisions being made. 

The understanding is not there anymore because the referees are now embracing technology and the use of the video referee too much. 

I get that being a referee can be hard - I did three years of refereeing taking control of some high profile soccer games on the north shore in Sydney, at just 14 years old. 

Realistically, if you perform badly at your job, you’d be called in and asked to explain.

This is the analogy I am drawing. 

The ‘heat of the moment’ cliché is becoming lesser relevant. 

Yes, poor decisions are made, and we all watch it and accept it. 

The coaches and managers might complain, but they move on, as do the rest of us fans. 

But the NRL is a whole new level. 

If your woeful in the English Premier League, arguably the most watched sporting league in the world, you will get dropped - but not in the NRL.

Perhaps NRL higher officials, media, and spectators should try watch an English Super League game where there is the rare occasion of abuse of referee’s or media assassination of referee rulings. 

A referee should be a referee because they love the sport – not because he or she is a self-righteous sort of person who likes to tick people off. 

Let us let referees enjoy the sport as a fan and let their knowledge and experience of the game referee for them. 

The pressure comes from the employers more than not. 

There are so many technicalities to each and every rule that no one’s interpretation is the same. 

Consistency is literally impossible for this reason. 

As for the video referee, I can barely comment anything positive to say on the subject. 

At the end of the day these blokes are set up to fail. 

Let’s go back to the Reynolds and Graham incident. 

If NRL referees are suddenly telling us that players can’t attempt a charge down to win the game for their team that will do me. 

There was absolutely no malice intended from the Bulldogs captain regardless of injury to the player - and I will remind you that it is a contact sport. 

Graham wasn’t going for a contact tackle, or even trying to make contact. 

I see it purely as an accident at a charge down. 

We see charge downs all the time that go for the man and the ball, but this was not one. 

Can we worry about punishing the players who do things like punching and lifting in tackles where they actually mean it? 

The fact is that the rules of the game are so complicated that they blanket these kinds of things instead of clearly looking at the incident at hand.

One of Rugby League’s biggest issues is over-officiating, and it has been for years.