I feel sorry for the ref there. Both coaches and teams push the boundaries; he either blows the pea out of the whistle (and he gets canned) or he doesn’t (and gets canned).
Its the cynical play by the teams why people don’t go to the footy.
I don't feel sorry for the ref at all.
I feel sorry for us poor suckers who have to put up with inconsistency and poor decision making from these clowns.
It's not cynical play that's turning fans off, it's knowing that at any point your team's chances can be destroyed by - oh, I don't know - say a ref sinbinning a player for a tackle that was fractionally late and isn't high. A tackle that probably wasn't even worth a penalty.
The most common complaints about the game these days are about the bunker (don't start me) and refereeing consistency. Why was A a sinbin and not B? What was that 6 again for? Side P have been lying all over the ruck all night, why suddenly penalise team D for exactly the same thing?
All we want from the refs is consistency and an understanding for the feel of the game; unfortunately the current refereeing system doesn't seem to encourage either.