Anybody else losing faith with RFL match officials?

[cpwigan]

Just been watching Wire v Bulls first 40. Bradford's first try was from a knock on but video referee Ganson said otherwise and then Wire's 3rd try came from a pass 2 yards forward with the pitcv markings to help Silverwood who decided otherwise.

How long has Cummings been in charge? Too long IMO

[ancientnloyal]

Just after seeing Silverwood cock up a decision... the wolves player touched the ball... didnt give another set of 6 in the enemy 10 metre... pathetic, unexcusable.

[MrDave]

...not just the match officials but the whole RFL they are turning rugby league into a joke full of stupid gimmicks.

[ian b]

Just been watching Wire v Bulls first 40. Bradford's first try was from a knock on but video referee Ganson said otherwise and then Wire's 3rd try came from a pass 2 yards forward with the pitcv markings to help Silverwood who decided otherwise.

How long has Cummings been in charge? Too long IMO

cummings was useless mate so what chance have we got.

[Matthew]

I'm not losing faith with RFL officials - I've lost it completely.

You may as well flip a coin for most of the decisions - at least then there would be a good chance that 50% of them would be right - you'd probably get more consistency too.

None of the current SL refs are anywhere near the standard of their RU equivalents - mind you; if they had cummings in charge of the RU refs; I sure that their standards would plummet to below that which you would expect to see in the average colts game.

[the_cow]

Wow! I actually agree with a cpwigan post!

The poor level of officiating is now getting to the point whereby it is undermining the credibility of the game. The RFL really need to focus on cleaning up the rule book and making the rules clearer and more prescriptive, rather than leaving it up to the refs interpretation. The refs then need to look to get consistency across the season, rather than changing their minds from game to game.

My own personal bug-bear is the forward pass. This is one of the most basic & fundemental elements of the game. Yet refs seem to turn a blind eye if it is marginal (never mind the wire game yest!). The easiest way I could see to sort this is to say that flat = forwards, although this would be detrimental to the game.

Touch judges need to become more active and should be more responsible for forward passes considering they look down the line rather than being in the thick of it and perhaps having players block your vision. The 'offside' rule in footy is governed by the linesman, why in rugby cannot the t.j not make the call?

If I were joe public who knew nothing about rl and turned on yesterday to see the Bradford v Wire game and saw the ridiculous forward pass for the Wire breakaway try to actually be given as a try, I would think it was a joke and therefore may be that rugby league as a whole was a joke! Is this the image we want to promote through the actions of a referee? It is getting to the stage whereby ref errors are deciding the result of a game, not the actions of the players.

[gpartin]

Was talking to a mate of mine yesterday who is a Wire fan and a referee. I asked him how they were able to get away with dropouts so far in front of the line and with every player in front of the kicker (as I just mentioned in another thread). His argument was that all teams do it and there'd be too many penalties if the refs were strict on it. In other words they give it as and when they feel like it, and because when they do its technically right nobody can really argue. The same goes for kickoffs, - the occasions I can remember this happening this season were once in the Cas v Wire game where Wire benefited and twice in the hull v wire game where Wire benefited both times (in the first half when the game was still close). I made a point of watching the kickoffs in the 2nd half of the Hull game and Warrington were offside at every kick off. Decisions like this that are given so inconsistently are the hardest to take because the times when they aren't given isn't down to human error but when they are it can completely change the flow of the game.

[cpwigan]

Was talking to a mate of mine yesterday who is a Wire fan and a referee. I asked him how they were able to get away with dropouts so far in front of the line and with every player in front of the kicker (as I just mentioned in another thread). His argument was that all teams do it and there'd be too many penalties if the refs were strict on it. In other words they give it as and when they feel like it, and because when they do its technically right nobody can really argue. The occasions I can remember this happening this season were once in the Cas v Wire game where Wire benefited and twice in the hull v wire game where Wire benefited both times (in the first half when the game was still close). I made a point of watching the kickoffs in the 2nd half of the Hull game and Warrington were offside at every kick off. Decisions like this that are given so inconsistently are the hardest to take because the times when they aren't given isn't down to human error but when they are it can completely change the flow of the game.

Spot on GP. It's the same with the 2 feet behind the line rule.

[gpartin]

Yep, 2 feet behind the line (ignored or penalised), dragging a player into touch (scrum defence or penalty attack), not playing the ball properly (ignored or penalised), ball knocked out as part of 2 man tackle (penalty for ball stealing, scrum, 6 more tackles), player thinking he's not tackled and continuing to run (defender tackles again and gets penalised, attacking player gets penalised, refs gets attacker to play the ball), attacking player holds down defender (penalty attack, penalty defence [very rare]) etc etc these are all decisions which are stupidly inconsistent and refs can give them either way and can have massive outcome on a game. There are times when it seems that every 50/50 decision goes against you but because they are by very nature so difficult to judge the RFL won't see them as bad decisions so the refs can influence the outcome of a game by their own interpretation and are beyond reproach. I also don't think its a coincidence that decisions seem to even themselves out when a game is won or lost. As fans we have teams that we dislike intensely and teams that we don't mind too much. Its blatantly obvious that most referees will have been fans before turning to refereeing and at the very least will have at some stage had their favourite and least favourite teams. Is it actually as inconceivable as some would have us believe (as I have in the past) that some referees are actually biased and use their interpretation of the aforementioned rules in order to influence the result without leaving themselves open to substantiated accusations of corruption by the RFL?

[botica]

I have totally lost any faith I might have once had.
I remember when the referees were part time there were just one or two you dreaded getting on the sheet, now i doubt there is a good un amongst the lot of em!!
I feel this profesional status has made them less profesional, they hang out together, feed off each others woes and experiences and generally are just getting really poor.
You watch the aussie referees and wow, i know there are 2 now, but even before they were so much better than what we had. Ashley is a prime example. He wasn't too bad when he first graced our shores, then it didn't take too long before the others had a chat and asked him to stop making them look bad and POW he was rubbish!!!