02 March 2024 , 07:13
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The problem with common sense is it’s not always common practice.
Everybody was shaking their heads at that decision to send off Hull’s Nu Brown for an accidental head clash at Warrington last week. There just seemed to be no common sense applied to it whatsoever. But thankfully, this time, it has been used: Brown hasn’t got banned and, not only that, the RFL have quickly amended the rules which is great news.
One of the big complaints about many sport’s ruling bodies is that they are out of touch, they don’t know what to do and don’t know how to react.
But they’ve done the opposite, here. They’ve acted in a really positive way which is great for the game. Red cards for those sorts of incidents is not a look the game wants or needs.
Usually, when you have a red card, there’s still some people thinking it should be a red card, no matter what. But this, for me, is the only time ever where I’ve not seen one single person who saw that incident thought it was a sending off offence.
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The RFL should be applauded for acting so swiftly. And hopefully we won’t see any more instances like that moving forward.
Marcus Griffiths shows Nu Brown a red card - since overturned. (PA)It’s good to see the players getting a bit of a voice this week, too, and setting up their own meeting with the RFL.
Well done to those involved in doing that, people like Alex Walmsley and Ryan Brierley. They have said the players need to finally form a strong union. The problem that has had over the last 25 years is apathy from the players: they want to make a difference but don’t turn up to do things.
They’d have to stay behind after training, listen for a bit, sign things and put a bit of effort in; some players wanted a union without any effort. If you’re going to change the status quo, it needs effort and commitment from a large group of people. We were never able to achieve that critical mass of people when I played.
Hopefully that will now change, they’ll be able to get a union off the ground and they’re able to get a bigger say in the game around the challenges it faces.
I wish them the best of luck in that going forward.
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