It'd be nice if the touch judges learn the rules as well.
The penrith Kenny one the trainer ran straight to the linesman yelling stop the game...stop the gaaaaaame.
touchie did even though the rules state that only after an initial assessment can the trainer call for it. Trainer wasn't even at kenny. touchie should've said...go and assess then I will. I mean the guy was grabbing his foot behind the play. Why wont officials just think?
Anyway Kent says....
dock teams points = no more diving.
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Parramatta forced a drop-out and, behind 8-6, fronted up to attack Penrith’s tryline once again.
Blake Ferguson took the hit-up off the dropout and Reagan Campbell-Gillard took the next one off the ruck, Mitch Kenny was unable to get up.
“Stop the game, stop the game,” the linesman soon says to referee Ashley Klein.
One more play and the game is stopped.
When Kenny went down
Penrith trainer Pete Green did not go to Kenny, but instead went to the linesman to tell him to stop the game.
So with Penrith out on their feet and less than five minutes left and Parramatta pressing their line the linesman says “Stop the game”, just as Penrith wished.
Under NRL rules, the game can be stopped only after the trainer has carried out an “initial assessment”.
His decision to go straight to the linesman, rather than assess Kenny, gave Penrith’s defence more time to rest.
This one action, like every action in the NRL, had a consequence that affected the rest of the game.
Who knows if Parramatta might have won or if Penrith might have been even braver.
Given they have already got their reward, which was victory and a place in Saturday’s preliminary final while Parramatta fly back to Sydney this week, their season over, will we see the Panthers or any other team doing it again?
The NRL is investigating the incident. But even if it’s proven that the rules were broken,
in the football club mindset any kind of financial penalty is irrelevant.
Some unknown face in administration would pay it with money pulled from a well-lit poker machine in the leagues club, so no real penalty there.
It would have no impact on football departments and, particularly, the coaches who drive the win-at-all-costs mentality. All they care for is the result, not consequence or reputation.
For too long the NRL has operated with an “acceptable penalty” mentality.
They express concern at certain incidents, but not enough to impose a penalty strong enough to ensure it will never happen again.
So teams take them on, happy to take the risk and pay the price if they get caught.
It was a moment that changed the game, and nobody will ever know how.
Given the high intensity that it was played, that just five minutes was left and a two-point difference – and Penrith needed to find a break – Parramatta had a right to feel hard done by.
For too long the NRL has gone softly-softly on rule infringements. This policy of acceptable penalties, where teams decide it is worth the risk, continues to undermine the game.
Even Panthers coach Ivan Cleary has acknowledged as much. Cleary said recently in relation to another incident that coaches will continue to bend the rules as long as the NRL allows them to do it.
Cleary was imploring the NRL to act. They didn’t, and so on Saturday his team appeared to be the beneficiary.
For too long the NRL has had a soft mindset of acceptable penalties. They will punish a club but never enough to stop them, or any other club, from doing it again.
American sports punish teams with enormous fines but they also strip their draft picks.
It is why the last major salary cap scandal in the NFL was in the late 1990s, after which the NRL has had at least half a dozen.
The AFL has had no significant cap cheating since Carlton was busted and stripped of draft picks which set them back years.
With the absence of draft picks the greatest fear within an NRL club is competition points.
While this particularly indiscretion would not warrant that action, at some point the NRL will have to look at changing the rules.
Faceless fines are not the answer. Simple rules, and stern punishment, is.
The one punishment teams fear is losing competition points.
With no draft picks to strip from clubs, strip them of competition points in following seasons.