South Sydney utility Nathan Peats could be facing a stint on the sidelines following his cannonball tackle on Newcastle’s Alex McKinnon, but calls from Wayne Bennett for the banning of third-man-in tackling could be tough to implement, says referees boss Daniel Anderson.
McKinnon was left in a heap after Peats speared his legs when they were firmly planted in the ANZ Stadium turf just before halftime in Souths’ 25-18 win on Saturday.
The incident incurred the wrath of Knights coach Bennett who wants the play to be outlawed after his back-rower was expected to spend six weeks on the sidelines with a syndesmosis ligament injury.
“The game’s got to ban it. It will only stop when the game gives the referees the authority and backs them to get that guy out of the tackle,” Bennett said.
“They’re caught by two players, held up – the third guy comes in and that’s when the damage is done.”
Bennett admitted his side used the tactic, but said he would be happy to see it rubbed out of the game.
“It’s wrong – I don’t believe in it but the team’s disadvantaged if you don’t do it,” he said.
Referees boss Daniel Anderson said it was hard for referees to adjudicate on a cannonball as third-man-in plays were so common in a game and most were legal.
“The cannonball is an illegal tackle but the difference between it and a legal tackle is the force of it and the style of it,” Anderson told AAP on Sunday.
“There are a lot of third-man tackles and they all have the same starting point and the same technique but they use different force so it’s quite a difficult adjudication measure for referees.
“It’s not like a shoulder charge where you can say ‘don’t use your arms’. It doesn’t have any indicators except for force and the direction of where the tackle is made.
“It’s something we need to work on.”
Peats is the third Souths player to be caught up in a cannonball row in recent years with former halfback Chris Sandow injuring Brisbane’s Josh Hoffman in 2011 and Issac Luke doing likewise to Dave Shillington when playing for New Zealand against Australia later that year.
That resulted in the NRL then issuing guidelines stipulating players must be penalised if they forcibly spear an opponents’ legs when they are in a vulnerable position.
However, Anderson said scrapping a play that’s such a fundamental part of the defensive side of the game would be a tough sell.
“It’s difficult – rules are not made up by me or just anyone else,” he said.
“The NRL competitions committee look at the welfare of the game, and most of the rule change adjustments came through that body.
“If it is to be a rule change, it would have to go through that body.”