The NRL will introduce a sin bin crackdown this weekend after acknowledging their referees should have marched four players in Round 4.
NRL head of football Graham Annesley emailed all 17 clubs on Monday afternoon informing them that moving forward players will be binned for contact with the head.
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There was uproar at Magic Round in 2021 when a similar directive was given to referees and 14 players were binned in farcical scenes.
But after several tackles over the weekend, which the match review committee deemed careless grade two offence, went unpunished the NRL decided to act.
Jarome Luai (Tigers), Jordan Riki (Broncos), Tom Gilbert (Dolphins) and Reed Mahoney (Bulldogs) all stayed on the field before later accepting either fines or suspensions.
“The NRL have been sprung into action after a wild weekend, too much foul play in their opinion,” Phil Rothfield said on NRL 360.
“Graham Annesley has emailed all 17 clubs late this afternoon and said from here on, high tackles will be an instant sin bin and they have found four instances from the weekend, Riki, Luai, Mahoney and Gilbert.
“They’ve said the referees and the Bunker got them all wrong.”
NRL great Gorden Tallis supported the NRL protecting the ball carrier.
“If you’re running the ball, you should have no fear that your head is ever going to get hit, so I like the rule,” he said.
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Brent Read agreed all except Mahoney should have been marched which set off Rothfield.
“Just watching that Reed Mahoney one, there’s not too much in that to be honest. I don’t even know if he hit him in the head, the other three were all head contact,” Read said.
“Are you serious? The left forearm attacks the head, if you think that’s all right, you have no idea,” Rothfield responded.
“I think it’s a cheap shot, fine, but I don’t think it’s as severe as the other three and you know who agrees with me, the match review committee, because they only gave him a grade one for that and all the others got grade two,” Read said.
“The match review committee, they stuffed that up. I can tell you top officials at the NRL were absolutely shocked that Reed Mahoney is not sitting out for at least one week for that cheap shot.”
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Braith Anasta sided with Read while Tallis said Mahoney’s only mistake was making slight contact with the head.
“This incident was stupid, he shouldn’t have done it, some people are calling it a dog act, but I didn’t think it was actually that bad,” Anasta said.
“It’s in the rules, the only thing is he got in contact with his head. You’re allowed to dive on someone if they’re laying there,” Tallis said.
“If that’s in the rules we might as well all give up… this game is tough enough,” Rothfield said.
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