Like many fans I get frustrated by rules in our game that don't make sense or just seem unfair. So if I ever get the chance to take the red pen to the rule book, here's what I'd do.
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Full coverage of the St George Illawarra DragonsThe corner post: WIN's Andrew Voss has turned his dislike of the corner post into quite a crusade, and he's completely correct. A player can have his legs in the air centimetres before or after the corner post and be deemed to be in the field of play. But if those legs touch the corner post, even half a metre up - he's no longer in play, even though they're still in the air.
Everywhere else on the field a player is still in play until a part of their body touches the ground on the wrong side of the white stripe. So it makes no sense to have these four tiny zones at each corner of the field where the rule is different.
Solution: Leave the posts there to help the refs work out if a kick has gone into touch or touch-in-goal but a player touching them means nothing.
Shortening the 10: This happens when a tackled player gets up and takes a few steps before playing the ball. The ref used to move the defence back to maintain the 10m but now calls out "you've shortened the 10" and leaves the defence where they are.
My problem with this is what happens to the markers who are trying to get into position. Many times I've seen defenders get into what would have been the correct position had the attacker not walked off the mark but then get penalised for being offside. Or the attacker walks off the mark, pushing the markers (who are in the right position) to either side. The ref then pings the markers for not lining up square.
Solution: Tell the player who walks off the mark to go back and play it. Once the attacking team realises they're just giving the defence more time to get set, they'll stop doing it because there's no advantage any more. Or maybe give the markers more latitude - if they've made the effort to get to the right spot only to be pushed off by the ball carrier, then class them as being onside.
Passing after called held: A player doesn't hear the ref call "held" and passes it or tosses it out just a split second after the call. The ref then pings him for passing after being tackled. I don't think the refs want to do this but are just hamstrung by the rules.
Solution: Give him the ball back and tell him to play it. Same goes for a player who continues to run after being called held.
Held up in goal: Today, if an attacking player is held up over the line, they get the ball back 10m and the tackle count continues. This irritates my sense of fair play. It's the attacking team's job to score a try and the defending team's job to stop them. If he's held up, then the attacker has failed while the defenders have succeeded.
Why then does the failed attacker get rewarded with the ball? Shouldn't the side who actually did their job get the reward?
Solution: Dunno. The result of a held-up call used to be a scrum, which worked back in the day when scrums were a contest. But that's not the case any more. Do you give the ball to the defenders on the goal-line? Or maybe the 5m line?
All I do know is, if the attackers weren't good enough to ground the ball the first time, they shouldn't be given another go.
Time off: We've all seen this one. Late in a close game and the team in front has just let in a try. You just know they'll dawdle to the halfway for the restart to take as much time off the clock as possible. When it's your team that's behind it's incredibly frustrating and robs the game of a degree of excitement.
Solution: Wave time off after the conversion attempt, so the team can walk back to halfway as slowly as they want without disadvantaging the opposition. Or maybe still wave time off but the team has to kick off within 30 seconds or risk a penalty.
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