Taking advantage of poor refereeing

[king_sirro]

Yesterday's ref was poor for both teams. In my opinion the game came down to who could take advantage of him the best. Unfortunately this is a part of the game we always fail at.

Penrith took full advantage by holding us up in defence and when the ref called held they then wrestled us to the ground. This happened nearly every tackle giving them a good 2 seconds extra to get set. On the flip side how many times did you see a Penrith player standing in the tackle when held is called and we just allow him to play the ball? We have to be smarter here, it just isn't good enough. 2 seconds slower play the ball for us all game is a huge thing to overcome and we brought it on ourselves. There was no ref bias yesterday, just a guy out of his depth that the better team took advantage of.

 

[Pascoes_barber]

(Lack of) play the ball speed is a big bugbear of mine - it is consistently glacial, Tigers must have the slowest PTB on average across the entire comp.

 

[Tom Shines]

Losing the ruck battle…. nothing new right ?

 

[innsaneink]

I brought this up a couple of times yesterday.
I recall r reading somewhere some time back we don't have a wrestling coach or work on it at training
How embarrassing is it when three WTs forwards can't put one. Opponent on the deck

I'd love to know for certain the facts regarding us and wrestling at training
* do we do if
*do. We have a coach
* do other teams. Do it?

 

[BlackWhiteGold]

I brought this up a couple of times yesterday.
I recall r reading somewhere some time back we don't have a wrestling coach or work on it at training
How embarrassing is it when three WTs forwards can't put one. Opponent on the deck

I'd love to know for certain the facts regarding us and wrestling at training
* do we do if
*do. We have a coach
* do other teams. Do it?

Yes Steven Babic is our wrestling coach. Was a number of years with the Raiders then Eels last year.

 

[innsaneink]

But is it poor refereeing or is it them subconsciously favouring teams "expected to win" ie: not us.

 

[innsaneink]

Yes Steven Babic is our wrestling coach. Was a number of years with the Raiders then Eels last year.

Thank you BW&G.
We're not very good at it apparently

 

[BlackWhiteGold]

Thank you BW&G.
We're not very good at it apparently

Not currently

 

[AmericanHistoryX]

But is it poor refereeing or is it them subconsciously favouring teams "expected to win" ie: not us.

Or the bookies are involved.... gamble responsibly....

 

[tig_prmz]

I don't think Penrith got to this level of manipulating refs overnight.

Main thing is to stay in the game, even if you lose you're learning. Your brain is ticking, you're still trying to win. The reason we don't improve is because we have often lost the game in 60 minutes.

 

[NT_Tiger]

Or the bookies are involved.... gamble responsibly....

Thats the angle I'd follow. Especially after the refereeing debacle with the cowboys last year.

 

[Buttface]

But is it poor refereeing or is it them subconsciously favouring teams "expected to win" ie: not us.

Nailed it.
The only way to change that unconscious ref bias is play as best as we can, do all the things that take no talent and be the best at them, ie be the fittest, most tenacious, and passionate, plus sprint training and wrestling for all. Make sure that when they run out there they know the refs are picking on us and to be extra vigilante and lastly be nice to the ref. I know this might sound silly but take it from someone who grew up with referees, it goes a long way, (Cam Smith was the best at this I’ve ever seen), and they remember it bcoz everyone hates them. Including me.

 

[Tucker]

It has always seemed obvious to me that manipulating the ref is a big part of the game and our squads are pathetic at it. The good sides bend the rules to breaking point whilst talking to the ref IN HIS LANGUAGE. They use the correct terminology, speak in ref lingo. Cameron Smith used to convince refs that his side were being hard done by, suggesting penalties were in order, by knowing the rule book backwards and being able to think critically and strategically whilst under fatigue. This kept his side rolling up field with minimal effort.

How do we combat this? Being super fit and have an organised line in defence helps, having a captain and vice captain who are smart, articulate and personable with the refs does even more. We all know that the higher you get in footy levels, the more you’re eyes are opened to “areas of advantage”. The jump from schoolboys to local first grade is huge, you are taught many grubby tactics to gain advantage. If you make rep sides this education continues….and so on right through to NRL. It doesn’t seem to happen with us. Our teams are too nice. They don’t play the ref game properly. Most other teams would have pressed the ref to check Tupou’s “drop” the other day. We just accepted the decision. Most other teams would have demanded a sinbin for the Olam trip…a lot would have stated penalty try. We just don’t play the ref game correctly and as the old saying goes “the squeaky wheel gets the oil”.