I think we might be a chance against the canes, if they can let two in from the rebels we should be good for at least.....2 .....ish.....maybe
Printable View
I think we might be a chance against the canes, if they can let two in from the rebels we should be good for at least.....2 .....ish.....maybe
Gees watching the Chiefs destroy the Brumbies makes me think we played a very good game last week 😳
Good to see some sensible refereeing about the high tackle, in contrast to last night's farce.
Isaak Fines is playing well since he came on, but it appears that Banks ran out of vaseline before the game.
Who will be the leading Aussie team by the end of the round.
Oh dear! I think the Force had the best game of the round!
We'll be just outside the top 5 !
I just noticed this quote on The Roar....... "Thorn himself has to wear some of the blame for his team’s inept performance last night. The Saders in attack consistently used decoy runners to setup their backline yet not a one Reds defender had the nous to use the decoy as interference preventing him from tackling the ball carrier, which the ref would then have been forced to acknowledge."
What do some of you, particularly our resident visually challenged friend, think of this? I think it is being coached as all NZ teams do it very well. I don't believe these are genuine decoys and should not mean that defenders need to take a dive to gain the referee's attention. I mentioned it here way back when we were last in SR.
This is a genuine question and I'd be happy to be enlightened if I'm seeing things wrong. Been watching both codes for a very long time and I think I know what an obstruction looks like. Cheika even refers to this as a "screen" which describes what I'm seeing perfectly. I have no problem with decoy runners, so long as they don't impede defenders. To be a genuine decoy runner I'd assume you need to be running from behind the ball carrier rather than loitering in front of the first receiver to run interference for him. It often involves changing direction and running at a defender, with a side step at the last second to avoid contact. I believe this is covered, without reference to actually making contact, in Law 10.....
DEFINITION
Foul play is anything a person does within the playing enclosure that is against the letter and spirit of the Laws of the Game. It includes obstruction, unfair play, repeated infringements, dangerous play and misconduct which is prejudicial to the Game.
(b) Running in front of a ball – carrier. A player must not intentionally move or stand in front of a team-mate carrying the ball, thereby preventing opponents from tackling the current ball-carrier or the opportunity to tackle potential ball-carriers when they gain possession.
Penalty: Penalty Kick
(c) Blocking the tackler. A player must not intentionally move or stand in a position that prevents an opponent from tackling a ball carrier.
OK, I'm not a referee, so my comments must be read with an acknowledgement of that fact.
it is possible to run a line where you are behind the ball carrier but in front of the intended recipient, it's the bread and butter of the basic second man play, one bloke runs early and hard at an inside shoulder, while another one delays the run a second and goes for the outside shoulder. In this situation, it was my understanding that, as long as the pass went in front of, or wider than the first player, it was unlikely to be an obstruction. Obviously the onus is then on the leading runner to keep reasonably clear of the tackler, but this becomes harder when the passer is looking to delay the pass as long as possible in the hope that the tackler makes a decision who to go for and then the ball gets thrown to the other runner. I guess the difficulty comes in the timing. If the tackler commits to the inside runner, begins the motion of tackling THEN the pass is thrown, is it obstruction? I would say no, defender made a choice and the passer was good enough to respond.
It's a lot more common though these days to see both runners running at the same gap, which obviously means the decoy hits the gap first and the ball carrier follows through. Regardless of when or where the pass was thrown, it's fair to say this is obstruction.
The other one that usually comes from this tactic is the forward pass to the first runner when the tackler holds off making a decision until the first runner has overrun the ball a la Lolesio's try against the Force in Round 1
Your second example is what I'm talking about.
Fair, but who's to say how it is interpreted, does the ball passed behind the back and fractionally outside the first runner absolve them of the obstruction call?
It's a bit of a loaded dice, like the high tackle protocol, there seems to be a bit of "attackers can do what they like, defenders have to deal with it" at the moment, not sure whether that's designed to attract the Rugby League crowd or whether it's just lawmakers not thinking
I know you don't watch it, but the NRL recognized the problem quite a while ago and came up with a few boxes to tick in judging obstruction along similar to what you talked about. It's not a complete solution as quite a few tries are disallowed (wrongly IMO) when defenders take a dive as it is quite definitive. Secondly, it mostly only gets a run if a try is scored.
I was wondering if you were going to take that as a dig against league, it wasn't intended that way, but whenever anybody in rugby seems to have the great idea that we need to compete with league for eyeballs, they always seem to think that unfettered attack is what will do it.
Perhaps we should consider that, rather than trying to steal eyeballs from league, maybe we should be generating a unique product that doesn't need to fight with a (currently) more established and committed code