NRL News: League responds defiantly to referees' backlash after admitting Stephen Crichton incident

The NRL Football Chief Graham Annesley has defended his referees after tremendous backlash, although he admitted that the bunker referee who allowed Bulldogs captain Stephen Crichton to stay on the field for a high tackle against the Warriors was wrong. Round 25 of the NRL caused a number of controversial decisions – particularly relating to high shots and penalty balls – after three Manly players were sent off for ten fouls in the opening game of the round.

This set a precedent for many fans, who were then shocked when Crichton stayed on the field despite hitting Roger Tuivasa-Sheck in the head with his shoulder, knocking the Warriors star out of the game. The incident seemed worse than a punch from Manly's Haumole Olakau'atu the previous evening, which the Sea Eagles striker was controversially sackedbut the bunker official ruled that Crichton's 10 did not warrant a 10 in the bunker.

However, Annesley admitted in his weekly briefing on Monday that bunker umpire Liam Kennedy got the decision wrong and hinted he would be ruled out of play this week for a “poor decision”. The incident involving Crichton was one of 30 high contact penalties in round 25 in what has become an alarming trend in the game.

“We listened to the audio recording and it's a pure error of judgement,” Annesley explained. “The bunker officer involved simply did not adequately consider the impact of the tackle. They have criteria they look at, but they have to make an assessment of how serious this particular incident was.”

“It was simply a misjudgment. It takes a lot of time and effort to get the referees and the match reporting committee on the same page on these things. Sometimes judgement fails you and that's what happened in this case. We haven't made any appointments yet but you can probably tell from my comments that it was a serious error.”

Coach of the Gold Coast Titans Des Hasler criticized the “confusion” on Monday players, coaches and fans currently have about what constitutes a high tackle and what is likely to result in a player being cautioned or sent to the bench. And the experienced mentor echoed the sentiments of many disgruntled fans that the inconsistencies in refereeing need to be addressed ahead of the finals series.

Graham Annesley defends the consistency of NRL officials

But a defiant Annesley says referees make the right decisions more often than not, and says the numbers back up his argument. According to the NRL, 18 of the 23 players penalised for high contact at Grade 2 or 3 were either sent to the penalty box or sent off, meaning the Match Review Committee (MRC) agrees with the referees' decision about 78% of the time.

“We would like that number to be higher, 80 percent is not good enough,” said Annesley. “We need to get much closer to the perfect score here when it comes to tackles that are considered by the match report committee to be more serious types of tackles that result in a level 2 or 3 penalty being penalised with a penalty or a sending off.”

“Eighty percent is an indication that the referees have been pretty consistent about it over the course of the season. Because we've been pretty consistent about it, it sort of leads to the comments we had over the weekend where we've conditioned almost everyone to recognise what gets a penalty box or a sending off. When that doesn't happen, everyone is outraged.

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“That can only happen if they get most of them right, and they do, but it's not enough to make one mistake in one round because they should get them right.” However, league chiefs Peter V'Landys and Andrew Abdo have promised major reviews of the NRL's footy department following the recent controversies, and veteran league reporter Phil Rothfield has suggested the NRL will reduce the number of bunker umpires next season in a bid to achieve greater consistency.