‘There’s nothing there’ – Michael Hooper airs frustrations over ‘time-wasting’ after ‘softest’ penalty
Hooper has called for rugby to follow league's lead,
Former Wallabies captain Michael Hooper believes rugby union should follow league’s lead to cut out unnecessary time-wasting following an incident during the second Test between Australia and Wales.
Hooper, who recently announced his retirement from Australian rugby, believes that so much time is wasted reviewing foul play decisions, which can result in the TMO and referee being forced to make a call.
The legendary Wallaby flanker aired his views on Stan Sport’s Between Two Posts, where the panel discussed referee Nika Amashukeli’s decision to penalise Wales wing Liam Williams.
‘Softest’ sanction
The panel was full of praise for Amashukeli’s performance but highlighted the incident where Williams cleaned out Charlie Cale beyond a ruck.
The Wales veteran squared up with Cale after the ruck incident and pushed the back-rower in the face before he was flung to the ground by lock Lukhan Salakaia-Loto.
Assistant referee Matthew Carley notified Amashukeli of potential foul play, which the Georgian then reviewed with his TMO.
This led to a stoppage in play and eventually it resulted in a penalty against Wales for Williams clearing out the player beyond the ruck.
“Why are assistant refs getting involved for things like that? They don’t need to,” commentator and podcast host Sean Maloney questioned.
“It was the softest thing I’ve ever seen.”
Hooper was also bemused that the incident required a stoppage in play, with Salakaia-Loto’s actions prompting Carley to notify Amashukeli of potential foul play.
“I’ve said this for a couple of years now, we have got to look to our league brothers and just put it on report,” Hooper explained.
“Move straight on. I feel like we waste so much time.”
Bunker and on report
While Hooper believes that union can do better by following league’s lead with putting players on report – where the referee is able to notify the NRL of a possible foul play and it is reviewed by officials – he does believe that the current TMO Bunker review system works well.
“The yellow card to the red card, I think rugby’s actually breaking ground in that – it’s a really good way of doing things,” he added.
“So with Lukhan [Salakaia-Loto], it’s really clear cut, he’s going off, he’s going to have a spell and they’re going to assess whether it’s red card.
“That other one [Williams’ incident], you can put on report and the judiciary will look at it in two seconds and be done.
“There’s nothing there, but you don’t take away from the game.
“I reckon league is a bit ahead with the on report. I like that, and then it can be dealt with without emotion.”
Crowd’s influence
The ex-Wallabies skipper also believes that the referee and TMO can be forced into making a decision when they review it by the way the crowd reacts.
“Because when the ref goes to the scoreboard and then the crowd’s brought in, it might not even be a penalty and then the crowd starts getting involved and then the ref and TMO are forced to make a decision,” he continued.
“Just put something on report, move it on and the crowd forgets about.”
Morgan Turinui concluded: “Well, nothing in that situation was foul play. There’s no reason to come in.”
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