Video Ref???

[antonius]

What does everyone think? Where should his rulings start and finish? Do we need him at all?
After the controversy this weekend where we saw a big blunder with the knock-on ruling on Fri night, then yesterday although within the rules we saw the Knights defend a full set of six (which by the way was a repeat set after a penalty ruling by Hayne) to hold the Storm out, only to have the video ref send play back to the first tackle to look at a high tackle by Tahu. (how disheartening would that have been? even though quite within the new rulings.) We had the video ref get both of Tahu's rulings wrong, we had the video ref IMO incorrectly ruling a no try to Morris in the Broncos game for offside when the player invloved in the ruling didn't interfere with play at all? What use are they honestly, we wasted about 10 mins yesterday waiting for the guy to make rulings that 50% of the time were wrong anyway, I say get rid of them, let the three on field blokes do it. I cannot for the life of me see how a bloke sitting up in a box watching replay after replay can get it wrong so often, if he were getting them correct then yes they are a usefull tool in the game, but they are not getting them correct so they are of no benifit to the game IMO.

 

[Doctor]

What does everyone think? Where should his rulings start and finish? Do we need him at all?

The video referee will remain a part of the game - it would be an over-reaction to let one round of football and some mistakes in the past ruin what should be an accurate method of officiating.

I've said this many times but:
I'll defend the mistakes of on-field refs till the cows come home, but there is no room for errors in the officiating of video referees. The video tells the story 9 times out of 10 - on the 10th time when the vision is obstructed or does not give definative evidence either way, common sense would tell you that the benefit of the doubt should go either way:
In cricket, they've decided to give the benefit to the batsmen. In league, I understand, the doubt goes in favour of the attacking team.

Seems fairly clear-cut to me.

Some of the mistakes seen this weekend defy belief - how you can make such fundamental errors is beyond my understanding.

So much so that the usually-reserved NRL CEO David Gallop is fuming - he wants heads to roll, or at least people to investigate how it happened that so many mistakes were made.

Split-second on-field ref blunders is understanable - but many of these mistakes occurred despite the surplus of time afforded to make the decision.

Seems like someone is in line to be given the flick.......

 

[CJG 182]

I reckon they should only be used when called for, and not able to tell the ref things at any time. Only help when asked

 

[Jedda]

Considering most grounds now have a big screen why not put the final play or a slow motion of the grounding of the ball up there for the On-Field Ref to adjudicate on.

He then either awards the try, or resets the play as per the rules in each case.

 

[roopy]

Before video refs we had replays from a dozen angles that proved a try in nearly every game to be wrongly awarded - all the stories in the papers were about which team was ripped off that week. Pretty boring stuff.

The only alternative i can see is if you get a try if you have control of the ball when you go over the line - forget about the grounding - otherwise we need the video ref.

 

[Razor]

Only for in-goal rulings.

Currently if the ref thinks a player might have knocked on he won't call it, and thinks sending it up to the video ref is the right idea. But then if the player gets tackled, and scores of the next play he can't check then.

If the refs weren't gutless and if they think they saw a knock-on or offside and call it then, then by all means keep the video ref for all rulings. But they don't do that. If they think there's a knock on, they don't call it waiting for the try, but then that try doesn't happen on that play.

If the ref thinks it was fine, but isn't 100% sure, and wouldn't have called it if there was no video ref, that's the only time they should go to the video ref for instances outside the in goal.

 

[IanG]

Yeah I think leave it for just in-goal ruling however I don't have a problem with the Video Refs being able to rule of foul play

 

[Doctor]

Before video refs we had replays from a dozen angles that proved a try in nearly every game to be wrongly awarded - all the stories in the papers were about which team was ripped off that week. Pretty boring stuff.

The only alternative i can see is if you get a try if you have control of the ball when you go over the line - forget about the grounding - otherwise we need the video ref.

It's called a touch-down Roopy - it's from a sport called 'American Football'. :lol: ;-)
Most fair dinkum aussies will react with a certain amount of cyncism towards such a move.
The irony is that you don't actually "touch" the ball "down" - it's more like a run-over than a touch-down.

Considering most grounds now have a big screen why not put the final play or a slow motion of the grounding of the ball up there for the On-Field Ref to adjudicate on.

It works well in theory - but it's the control of the replay that is the most important factor in the decision. On-field referees would have to look at the screen, and keep watching until he is satisfied - it is time consuming because instead of looking at the aspects he wants, he has to watch the same replays over and over again - many of them may not be relevant for him, and furthermore the big-screen operators are compromised by a desire to give the crowd the perfect wide-screen angles, as opposed to giving the ref what he wants.

Refs talking into microphones telling them what they want.......sounds to me like a video ref would be much simpler.

In any case, we've certainly seen a weekend of strange decisions, there is no denying that.
I just get the impression we're over-reacting a tad - perhaps the problem isn't actually the system, but the people controlling it. Better training, perhaps a few more refs to decide on each replay - I'm sure the solution isn't to throw the whole system out.

 

[Danish Moo Cow]

Its called a TD over there simply cause you have to 'touch' that part of the ground. The down part only refers to the end of a play, everything is done in downs, first, second, third etc.

The other funny thing about Gridiron comparrisons is that the video ref there has been scrapped and re-implemented a few times over the years already. Now they've got the coachs being the only ones who can call for an adjuudication... but only one each half. And if the video ref finds against him, it costs them a timeout. If they're right, they can keep ask another question in the remaining half, but it doesn't continue over into the next.

The whole thing wrong with the video ref is that they keep having rulings to decide upon heaped on to them when in reality they are still strugging to make the simplest decisions that it was designed for in the first place. The sooner they scrap everything not to do with points from his hands, the sooner we'll have officials on the field confident enough to take the game by the scruff of the neck and have the gumptio nto make calls for themselves. The players will respect him more and he won't just be a lazy bum relying on others to do his job.

 

[~bedsy~]

I think we still need it for in goal rulings only. Sometimes it is hard for a ref to see what's gone on.

 

[northey]

but the video ref should not take 5mins to see a try ... it was so stupid.
glad to see that the nrl stood down 2 officials

 

[Chicken_Hunter]

Only for tries.. NOthing else.. Going back after a set has been completed for a high shot the video ref saw is stupid.. Not to mention going back when the touchy sees it, that rule is so annoying, it happened in the knights melb game.. We had just kept the storm out for a set of 6, once it was completed the touchy came in, reported a high shot that happened a fair few tackles ago and the storm got a penalty <-- worst rule ever.

 

[snapper]

What about kicks where chasers need to be identified as on or offside. Seeing this has been one of the most common scenarios that the video ref has been used for since being implemented. So many times i've seen kick chasers get to the ball so quickly that I've sworn they were offside only to be proven wrong by a replay that shows how well some plyers time their run. Would most people who say only keep the in goal rulings for video refs like to see us go back to trying to call these things that happen in the blink of an eye go back to someone like Shane Hayne who is obviously already struggling with his job as it is.

I believe they serve a vital roll in the modern game. Maybe a couple of people in the booth might pick up on something that an individual may not have picked up on( in the same way as it seems nearly everyone who watched the game picked up on the error, but maybe 1% overlooked it)

 

[Alex28]

the way advantage was played in the Tahu incident was just utter bull****.

 

[Misanthrope]

As much as it'll probably piss people off, I really don't mind how they work at the moment. I got frustrated with Hayne and his touch judges having no ability to make a call for themselves.

I don't care that the decision on Waterhouse went back to far because he still knocked on. I know it's not currently in the rules for a video referee to go back as far as he did- but I'd almost push for it to come into it. Imagine if that try had decided a grand final. My God, the controversy.

I also don't really mind the video referee ruling on high tackles and the like- but I agree with Gould when he said that the video referee was slowing the game down. If the on field guys can't make a judgement on the fly- then hand it off to the ref and give him a short amount of time to come up with a decision. I'm sick of waiting five minutes on each try.

 

[Matt23]

Tries and incidents reports, ie late or high tackles, or unseen infringements.