Whereas you are an embarrassing conspiracy theorist.

Oh dear..... you do hang onto that like a comfort blanket, don't you!

Is that 'ask the ref' Twitter (or possibly Facebook?), thing still going? It'd be interesting to if they'd touch this with the proverbial barge pole. They might tend to the diplomatic, but given the Aussies high handed attitude to their colleague, they might not. Not often they get a chance for some easy popularity. And not like the Aussies can treat them much worse.

I'm not forcing any issue. Just playing devil's advocate.

On the other hand the majority of this thread is claiming [uwholesale corruption[/u cost us a game rather than not performing for all but three minutes of an entire half.

Yet I AM the one out of order.



It's a mad, mad world.

At the end of the day the NRL like the NFL is a brand. As a brand it attracts big sponsorship (especially TV revenue) and to retain he NRL's brand value it needs to convince all it is the best and that also requires that the Australia team needs to be the best. I start to ask myself is that why they are always so keen on their own officials when they think there's a chance their team may be under pressure? It's not like we've not had this before is it? I then start to ask is their integrity in this sport any more?

Nobody, not the ref or VR, thought that Inglis had attempted to ground that ball.

If you truly believe that there is even the slightest possibility that what Inglis was trying to do there was an intentional attempt to ground the ball, send me your e-mail address, I have an uncle who is a prince in Nigeria who could use your help moving some money.

Regardless of anything else in that match, regardless of us shutting up shop too early, regardless of Clarke bombing two tries and Burgess knocking on tackle 2 in a great attacking set, regardless of not dominating the ruck against a team with no props, regardless of some of the silly mistakes, regardless of a second half as frustrating as the first was encouraging, the reason England lost that game was because of a botched decision from a home town officiating team, in the home teams favour.

Can I ask whether anyone thought England were going to win after we got into the second half? I didn't. We stunk second half.

You are right that corruption seems a strong word. It probably is. Years gone by that type of thing gets dismissed as the home team advantage. But we are getting to the levels of German Boxing where it has long been said you only fight there if you are confident of a knock out because you wont get a decision. That does the sport no favours and brings it in to far worse disrepute than what a player says on twitter for instance.

So it probably wasn't a conspiracy of match fixing proportions, but you cant take the moral high-ground when you argue against the need for neutral refs, lobby for a home team ref, then win on a botched call from them in your favour.

No, I fear your desire to be alternative has resulted in you losing yours.

A margin call is one where there is doubt. The Burgess knock-on/rip which could have gone either way, for example. The tackles on Smith after his kicks went is another. Even the two tries involving obstruction cases. Those are margin calls, and you'll note that I'm making no complaints about them. Nor would I have made any complaint about this if it [ihadn't[/i gone to the video ref, because I don't think it would be reasonable to expect the on-field referee to see that finger grounding the ball.

But as soon as it went to the video referee, there was clear, conclusive and undeniable proof that Hall grounded that ball. That his finger is pressuring the ball, on the ground is not a margin call, it's a fact. So it is a try unless there is a previous event which effectively makes the ball dead. So what's available ?

1) Was Hall onside ? Yes - try
2) Was there an England knock-on ? No - try
3) Was Inglis impeded illegally in seeking to clear the ball ? No -try
4a) Did Inglis deliberately ground the ball ? To do so, he would have had to deliberately put downward pressure on the ball in his own in-goal. The video very clearly shows that he sought to bat the ball dead, not ground it, so even if he did have contact with it then he was not trying to ground it - Try
4b) Did Inglis deliberately ground the ball ? To do so, he would have had to make contact with the ball and deliberately ground it before Hall did. There is no evidence at all that he did so - if there is no evidence then the rules of the game are that the attacking side is given the try. So - Try.
4c) Did Inglis deliberately ground the ball ? If there was clear and undeniable evidence that he did - and this is the ONLY possible reason for disallowing the try - then it's a drop-out. The video referee awarded a 20-metre tap - in other words, he acknowledged that there was NO evidence that Inglis grounded the ball at all - if he had, it could not have been a drop-out. So, given that the video referee decided that when Hall touched the ball it was still in play (ie, not grounded), then it HAD to be a try, because Hall exerted downward pressure on a ball still in play. Hence - try.

There is absolutely no way in which that was a margin call. It was a certainty, and every referee knows it. In this case, the video referee was a corrupt cheat. There is no way to deny that and I'd happily defend that claim in a court of slander or libel. There was no possible way in which he could reach the decision he did except to deliberately ignore the crystal clear evidence before him. It was a try. He saw it was a try, and he cheated to deny it, because he was an Australian, and if he'd given it, it may have knocked Australia out of the tournament. I have never seen anything like that on an international stage, ever. You can tell that he deliberately cheated because he invented the bizarre and clearly nonsensical explanation that Hall had contacted the ball "on the rise", when the video evidence was clear that he touched it on the floor. You can also tell that the Aussies know it was a try, because the best Sheens has come up with is "he didn't celebrate", which as every schoolboy knows, is not in the rulebook as one of the reasons to award a try.

You do yourself no favours by trying to argue for the sake of argument. There's no argument here. That was a try. That video referee just showed his utter lack of integrity and honesty to deliberately alter the outcome of an international Test match, and the Aussies arguing his case are cynical cheats who should be effing ashamed of themselves.

Get a grip, Mugwump.

So what? Since when did truth become a popularity contest?



Does that make you an illegal alien?



That's right. Failing to dominate the Australian pack physically, failing to kick for territory ... put Inglis under pressure, attack two Australian players who could barely walk and generally outclass the Australian spine for a full thirty five minutes in the second half was in no way responsible for our demise.

It was all crooked refereeing.

Pathetic.

You are a disgrace to your creed.

A disgrace.

And I'm not trolling.

Mind set was all wrong.I was saying one more try in that first 15 minutes of the second period would have killed them off.However, once we bombed that early chance under the sticks we showed no ambition whatsoever and it gave them the invitation to go in for the kill which is what they do best.

We had them like NZ had them last week but failed to hammer the nail in.NZ did.Simple as that.

Even if the try had been given, widdop still needed to get the kick from the touchline. Had he missed it, a draw wouldn't have put england in a much better position than they are now. They'd have still needed to beat NZ.

It'll work out for the best.

Perhaps not the same frame, but given that Hall's finger was on the ball only briefly and Inglis' hands are a decent distance away in that picture I showed then you'd have to be extremely foolish to believe his hands made it to the ball before Hall whose seems to be touching the ball in that shot.

Whilst I can accept someone playing devils advocate perhaps now is the time to accept the 'Inglis was touching it too' theory to be dead in the water?

The way he kicked the first two, i would have backed him.

Simply highlighting that nobody in actuality is making this argument, except you, and then only hypothetically, So it seems fairly safe that we can ignore a hypothetical possibility that nobody is actually saying is reality.

You think anyone with Nigerian heritage is likely to be an illegal alien? Seems an unnecessary rabbit hole to throw yourself down.

That's right, because all those things happened, and yet still if it wasn't for a botched refereeing decision from a home town ref, for the home team, after they had argued against neutral referees, and lobbied in favour of having said home town ref referee them, we wouldn't have lost. If that mistake doesn't happen, a try is given it is 16-16 with a minute on the clock (which would have restarted when the try was given) and a kick to come.

Can't recall bringing it up before, perhaps you're confusing me with one of the several other posters who've mentioned it since to highlight how ridiculous you made yourself look on that issue

No. I'm an honest ref who has awarded a last minute winning try in a final which denied his old team a trophy, and would do so again if it was the right call.

That's the difference between me and the video referee today - I'm honest and have integrity. He is a dishonest cheat. There is absolutely no logical or reasonable explanation for the decision he gave. It simply cannot be justified according to the rules of the game, and unlike a referee on the pitch, he had a very long time to look at it from several angles and at different speeds.

I defend refs for mistakes week in week out on these boards, because I know how hard it is. It gets a lot f@cking harder when some corrupt cheat like today's video referee makes such a clearly deliberately dishonest call, which discredits all referees in the eyes of all players and fans.

That guy was a cheating, cowardly disgrace to the entire refereeing profession, and while I'm sure the bent won't be losing any sleep over saving his country's embarrassment at being knocked out of the tournament, I hope he enjoyed it, because he'll go down in the history of the sport as the most dishonest referee ever to disgrace the international stage. He is scum, absolute, unforgivable scum.

What I'm saying is that [iby the standard of video refereeing I've seen since the very beginning[/i you can't pin the entirety of a defeat on a split-second margin call. Especially when we were so, so poor in the second half.

I mean Smith and Widdop managed to kick early for territory ONCE when we were crying out for it. Part of Saints' success this season was Brown's decision to switch to kicking early six games out from the playoffs and it came up spades. With the massive pack we fielded kicking early was a must.

And yet we have a former (current?) referee such as Roy (who I generally respect) claiming from a position of certainty that both the ref and the video ref were bent.

Madness!

There is? Allow me to correct you.

Two angles of the moment Hall touches the ball. Clear daylight between Inglis' hand and the ball. Not even marginal. He's nowhere near.



I'm not sure why you enjoy being an Australian apologist so much, but you're embarrassing yourself.

No - you are a disgrace.

If you honestly think both the ref and the video ref are bent (despite knowing all but nothing about them) - and the fact that the very same pulled an Australian try back on a shepherd you are crackers.

I wouldn't go as far as bent, it's better phrased 'under severe pressure due to the nature of their appointment'. Does that sound better?

If a neutral ref gives that decision we'd be on here debating the try or no try decision as we would any other controversial call. When the referee isn't impartial, he's from the nation that benefits and is employed by it's RL authority.

Aye, I doubt it's RL's Calciopoli. I'm reluctant to impugn Sutton the VR too much, because I just don't know what was going through his head.
But the Aussies had their elbows out with this appointment, as things turned out they needed a decision and they got it.
As gutterfax says, we can't change it, it's gone. But going forward there are other options. Now ain't a bad time to start thinking about them.

he hasn't missed with an attempt at goal this tournament. I like those odds

By predicting 360k I made myself look ridiculous? Seriously, nobody else had the balls to predict attendances before the tournament and when pressed to, many said a "slight" increase on 2008 would be good. I said 25% up was going to be the attendance ...as it turned out, 60% was and it was fantastic.
Still, it's nice that you remember it with such fondness too.....better to be though of at all than forgotten.
As for double headers.......well, there's 2 trains of though there and apparently they are both correct (depending who you talk to that is)



Anyhow, none of this is ever going to change the result from the game........but it does seem to be a very "English" thing to harp on about perceived sporting injustices. Not many Germans that I know (and I know a fair few having worked for a Hamburg based company) whine about "that goal" from '66, but I suspect there are grandchildren yet to be born who will talk about this "no try" until hell freezes over come.....or at least until England defeat Australia in a major Final, whichever happens first.