Annesley tells Sheens bunker erred, but process correct

NRL head of football Graham Annesley phoned incoming Wests Tigers coach Tim Sheens on Monday to admit that senior review official Ashley Klein had erred in awarding a penalty after the fulltime siren to North Queensland that cost his team just their fourth win of the season.

However, Annesley told Sheens, who is the Tigers head of football before taking over as coach next season, that referee Chris Butler had followed correct procedures in allowing the Cowboys to use a captain’s challenge after time had expired that led to Klein making the wrong call.

North Queensland centre Valentine Holmes kicked a penalty goal after Klein ruled that Tigers rookie Asu Kepaoa had acted as an escort to prevent Kyle Feldt from challenging for the ball from the kick-off before Daine Laurie caught it and fell to the ground in the belief the match was over.

The Tigers issued a press release on Monday announcing that they were officially seeking an explanation over the “game changing decision” that enabled Holmes to snatch a 26-27 win after the visitors had scored two late tries to take the lead 26-25 win one second remaining on the clock.

Annesley said Tigers officials would be welcome to listen to audio of the conversation between Butler and Klein as the referee tried to decide whether a captain’s challenge was permissible after he had blown his whistle.

They agreed it was allowable as Butler had only blown a short whistle to stop play, but not a longer whistle used to signal fulltime.

“The rules around a captain’s challenge allow for a challenge of any decision made by a referee to stop a game,” Annesley said.

“There are no boundaries around that other than it has to be a stoppage initiated by the referee and it has to result in a structured re-start, which in this case was the penalty given as a result of this incident.

“Under the laws, it says the captain can challenge a decision by the referee from the point of the stoppage back to the previous play-the-ball, so anything in that play from the kick-off can be challenged. They have to identify what they are challenging.”

Annesley said there had been other examples of a referee allowing a captain’s challenge after time had expired, with the most notable being the deciding State of Origin match of the 2020 series.

“You won’t find anywhere in black-and-white a specific rule that talks about whether you can make a challenge after time has expired or the last tackle of the game but in this particular case the referee blows the whistle after he has been told by the time-keeper that time has expired to stop play,” Annesley said.

“But that is not the end of the game. That first whistle is not a fulltime whistle, that is a whistle to stop play. Now that becomes a stoppage, and the challenge was mounted on the basis of the escort or obstruction that the Cowboys believe had taken place in that particular play.

“It is no different to if time had expired and a player is tackled on the ground, the referee blows his whistle and a player then dives on top of him with a swinging arm and hits him in the head.

“We are not just going to say we won’t deal with that because time had expired.

"The referee is still in control of the game and able to make rulings until such time as he blows his whistle multiple times and then they wave across their chest to signal fulltime.

“It is not the end of the game when a player falls to the ground and gets tackled.”

The only genuine issue, according to Annesley, was that Klein incorrectly awarded a penalty to the Cowboys after the challenge was allowed that decided the outcome of the match.

After promising Sheens on Sunday night that there would be a full review of the entire incident, Annesley was forced to call him on Monday to admit that there had been no obstruction by Kepaoa and the Tigers should have won the match.

“We have examined that carefully this morning, we have looked at all of the available footage and we are just not satisfied that there was enough in that incident to warrant the decision of the Bunker to award the penalty.

“These are matters of judgement from the officials but on review this morning we just don’t believe there was enough to award the penalty and that the on-field challenge should have been dismissed by the Bunker as an unsuccessful challenge.

“I had a conversation with Tim Sheens earlier this afternoon. I have explained to him the situation. I told him our views about the permissibility of the captain’s challenge, and I have told him our views about the outcome of the captain’s challenge.

“Our system is the equal if not better than any other sport in the world in terms of the capability that we have got wit the number of camera angles, high definition pictures and people in the bunker who have the technical expertise to operate the equipment.

“In this case we don’t believe they made the right decision but there are many, many decisions across the course of the year that would be impossible to make without the assistance of the Bunker.”