NRL confirm Tigers, Dragons dudded, and explains why Jarome Luai avoided bin
By Christian Nicolussi
August 7, 2023 — 7.32pm
NRL head of elite competitions Graham Annesley on Monday conceded the Wests Tigers and St George Illawarra were on the end of wrong refereeing decisions while adding physics was the reason Jarome Luai wasn’t sent to the sin-bin for his tackle on Nelson Asofa-Solomona.
Annesley confirmed during his weekly debrief of the weekend action that the Tigers had conceded a try from a Jack Wighton forward pass.
And the Dragons should have been awarded a try when Clint Gutherson tried to rake the ball from Jacob Liddle.
Annesley dismissed claims of an unconscious bias by match officials towards clubs at the wrong end of the ladder – and said most weeks there was a “conga line of clubs complaining about decisions, whether they won the game or not”.
“If you spoke to [NRL officials] Jared Maxwell or David Fairleigh about the conversations they have with coaches each week, I’d dare say 75 per cent of them, whether they’ve won or lost, believe they did not get the rub of the green,” Annesley told this masthead.
Wighton’s pass for Seb Kris was missed by a touch judge who was in line with the play.
Tigers fans were still only just getting over Annesley’s admission that Canberra should never have scored a try when the two sides met earlier this year after Luke Brooks was shoved in the back.
“Looking at this one with the camera on the halfway line, I don’t think you can reach any other conclusion than this being a forward pass,” Annesley said.
Annesley said Wighton was pushed over, and the ball dribbled along the ground, which may have distracted the sideline official, but “no doubt from where he was [standing], he thought the pass was OK, and if he didn’t, he calls it forward.”
Like frustrated Tigers coach Tim Sheens who made his feelings known about the officiating after the weekend loss, Dragons caretaker coach Ryan Carr was also baffled why Junior Amone had not scored after Gutherson had raked the ball from Liddle in the lead-up.
“You can see [Gutherson’s] fingers curl up on top of the ball and there is a raking motion that dislodges the ball; it means the tackle count should have re-started, and it should have been a try,” Annesley said.
Annesley cleared Zac Lomax of head-slamming Andrew Davey into the ground, and described it as more of a back slam, while Parramatta’s Ryan Matterson avoided being placed on report for a hip-drop tackle on Jack Bird because “there was minor force and he pushed the leg rather than fell on it”.
Meanwhile, Annesley said Luai was not given 10 minutes in the bin for his high shot on Asofa-Solomona because of the lack of force.
Penrith coach Ivan Cleary summed up the contest after the game as “a little fly against a big giant”.
“Having spoken to match review committee, what saved Jarome Luai from going to the bin was the degree of force, which is the main determining factor in these incidents,” Annesley said.
It was a busy Monday for NRL head of elite competitions Graham Annesley – and Dragons and Tigers fans did not like what he had to say.
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