I've got to disagree with you here (though I won't give you a negative rating for your empathy!) as there's no_frikken_way I feel for these jumped up little pricks who are blowing whistles these days.
They desperately avoid making real decisions on black and white things like off side, correct play the ball and walking off the mark and replace those calls with subjective "ruck infringement" rules applied unfairly and inconsistently throughout a game, constantly favouring one team or the other in a fairly blatant manner: and all too often it's where the scoreboard is at that governs their decision making.
Why does possession ALWAYS even up? If team (A) drops the ball for their first three sets in possession on the first tackle, team (B) should effectively remain 3 sets "ahead"
In the possession stakes (assuming ceterus parabus of course). Yet invariably the stats wind up reasonably close: the only real exception I've seen this year was in the Broncos v Scum game, where the Scum ended with much more ball. My guess is that the ref's didn't know which protected species to penalize so they did the next best thing: nothing.
Personally I'm just really goddamned SICK of games being decided by who capatilises on the momentum GIFTED them by the referees instead of a game being taken by the scruff of the neck by the players who are actually paid large amounts of money to do so. I miss the days of a Johns or a Langer or a Blake or Cliffy just taking control and owning a game, while the referees controlled just three things: the 10 meters, the foul play and counted tackles. Other than that they let the game flow... Now?? The whistle blowers think that THEY are the stars!! Look at Badger's ridiculous "look at me" hair cut!! Hartley never had weird hair. Annesly had good hair. Bronco Billy Harrigon and flowing locks but not *that* bad...and he was a decent referee.
Footy used to be about how good a footy player you were, not how well you adhered to some truly awful ruck rules developed in a knee jerk reaction to complaints of sooks like Bellamy, Bennet and Hasler et al.
Grrrrrr.... //end rant.
