‘Not sure who teaches him that’: Ivan Cleary calls out the ‘bigger’ issue in Bunker blunder

Ivan Cleary was left confused after a “pretty obvious obstruction” was overlooked in Penrith’s win over Manly, suggesting the NRL needs to have a more black-and-white approach to the ruling.

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The Panthers held on to pip the Sea Eagles on Sunday night but the victory would have been far more comfortable had it not been for a controversial Lehi Hopoate try in the second half.

Panthers halfback Nathan Cleary was sliding across in the defensive line before he seemingly had his path blocked by Clayton Faulalo.

The play was allowed to resume and Tolu Koula fired what appeared to be a forward pass to Hopoate, who scored in the corner.

Nathan Cleary was visibly unhappy with the call, but referee Wyatt Raymond told the Penrith co-captain he believed the obstruction did not have a bearing on the try.

The Bunker supported that ruling to the shock of coach Cleary, who said it was a “pretty obvious obstruction”.

“(There were) almost two lead runners actually taking out a player who’s actually heading towards where the ball’s going,” the Panthers coach added.

“I think we’ve got a bit of an issue when officials are making decisions on whether it’s affected the defensive line. Respectfully, I don’t think that’s something in their… do they learn how to do that when they’re learning about refereeing?

“I’m not sure about that. I don’t know how you say that. I mean, you don’t because it does.”

Both Cleary and Paul Alamoti were engaged by Manly’s lead runners Faulalo and Ben Trbojevic and had they got through the defensive line untouched, it would have been a perfectly executed play from the Sea Eagles.

With the timing of play Alamoti had no choice but to engage Luke Brooks out the back regardless of whether Cleary was obstructed or not.

However, it is hard to argue the Panthers halfback was denied a chance to potentially deny the diving Hopoate.

Either way, coach Cleary said the NRL risked entering dangerous territory if it continued to make similar subjective decisions.

In fact, instead he warned that the league could fall into the trap of rewarding “bad decisions”.

“Certainly the way we defend, if you lose one of the guys on the inside it absolutely affects the rest of what’s going on out there and I think it’s pretty obvious that, as I said, he saw the ball, he was heading towards it,” Cleary said.

“I think either one or two blokes clearly are in the way. So in other words, he was making a good decision.

“Whereas there’s plenty of bad decisions to get rewarded, and that’s the sort of change we tried to make last year. So in this case, I would say that was a good decision but he couldn’t get to where he needed to get to.

“I think the bigger thing is I don’t think we should allow the Bunker officials to make a decision that it has affected the defensive line or it hasn’t. I’m just not sure how he knows that, and who teaches him that.”