Blurred lines around concussion rules and penalties prove NRL is failing to protect players

The NRL is in its own firestorm at the moment. It needs an urgent review of penalties to protect its players. The current system is failing and it could be fatal.

He speaks of privilege not as entitlement but as benefit and, right there, his uncommon phrasing offers the first clue James Graham is not your average thinker.

Graham might be retired but he remains the greatest spokesman for the players. He brings dimension to the conversation about concussion, a mixture of intelligence and eloquence that cannot be ignored.

The NRL is in its own firestorm at the moment.

Jake Friend got knocked out a week ago, not for the first time, raising the conversation again about the long-time welfare of players.

Already his teammate and co-captain Boyd Cordner is stood down until round 12 after a series of concussions last season, which is unprecedented.

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James Graham is one of the game’s most eloquent spokesman regarding concussion. Picture: Brett Hemmings/Getty Images

Why it all becomes so confusing, though, was witnessed Thursday night when Felise Kaufusi knocked out Ryan Matterson in a tackle after adjusting his grip so his elbow could collect Matterson in the forehead and give the double effect of slamming the back of Matterson’s head into the ground.

Yet for his deliberate act of knocking a man out, the NRL match review committee hits him with a grade two dangerous contact charge. What does a grade three look like?

It proves the NRL needs an urgent review of penalties to protect its players. The current system fails to treat the punishment as a deterrent.

Just about every footballer in the land saw Kaufusi’s elbow shift as a deliberate act. Fox Sports commentator Greg Alexander was stunned while Andrew Voss somehow tried to mount a case for accidental contact, somehow explaining Kaufusi was trying to wrap up the ball.

“You can do both,” Alexander said. If nothing else, once Kaufusi got into the dangerous position, he did nothing to pull out. Then immediately looked at the touch judge to see if he saw.

Referee Ashley Klein did not send Felise Kaufusi of the Storm off despite placing him on report for a cheap shot on Ryan Matterson. Picture: Cameron Spencer/Getty Images

Do not listen to Melbourne coach Craig Bellamy, though.

“I didn’t think there was much to it, actually,” he said.

The game is undergoing tremendous change in the area of concussion but not quickly enough. Already the law enforcement is lagging. The referee, Ashley Klein, should have sent off Kaufusi, but I believe lacked the grit.

Several years back the NRL pushed through concussion protocols forcing players from the field, even if they had come around. Graham, the game’s greatest warrior, fought those mandatory rules.

It was his brain, his body, he said, and if he wanted to sign a waiver to continue playing he should be allowed.

The NRL said no.

“That was probably me trying to portray an image of being a little bit of old school,” Graham says. “I’m going to show everyone I’m not scared.

“Those psychological games when you’re going into the middle. Sport is quite psychological.

“In league, you don’t call anyone out like they doing in boxing, but you can paint a picture and portray who you want to be.

“It’s who I thought I wanted to be at that time.”

If he is anything, though, he is not the cliche.

Teammate Mitch Marsh checks on Ryan Matterson. Picture: Cameron Spencer/Getty Images

Along came James Graham on Tuesday night on NRL360, with confusion on the concussion debate all around, finding the words to explain a warrior’s way.

“As I went on the journey, I asked the doctors some questions about risks and then I asked myself some questions,” he said.

“And I decided that I was going to privilege the present over the future and I think was willing to take those risks.”

The present over the future … after an early life privileging the future over the present.

Graham sacrificed much as a young man to make it as an international footballer.

Having made it, he wanted to protect it, having found a life with meaning to it all.

It has created for him a life few get to live even as he accepts there could be a cost along the way.

He has a better understanding of concussion and its risks and possible treatments than anybody I know.

Change began when he met a woman, a neuroscientist at Monash University, friendly with his wife, Taryn.

Oh, you bet he picked her brain.

“I started going down the rabbit hole,” he says. “I started thinking quite deeply about life. Is my goal in life to live as long as possible?

“She told me that anything that disrupts your circadian rhythm regularly will reduce your life significantly.

“That puts ER doctors, pilots and, to be fair, rugby league players in that category. The evening games, they massively disrupt your circadian rhythm.”

James Graham suffered many concussions in his career. Picture: AAP Image/Darren Pateman

Footballers, he figured, were not that different from many people.

Once he accepted that, he began considering quality of life and the sacrifices, or lack of sacrifice, we all make to have the live we lead. There is where he found comfort in his choice.

It is not to say he is ignorant of the future and what it might hold, but that the reward is worth the sacrifice.

He has undergone blood and saliva analysis to establish his biomarkers to measure himself against in the future; and undertaken cognitive ability tests to establish benchmarks to measure if his brain capacity in the future has deteriorated.

And what of Matterson, who suffered his second concussion in less than a year on Thursday?

Matterson, 26, was housebound for eight weeks in 2018, also after a concussion.

At what point does his contract value suffer because he is deemed an ongoing risk, and what liability does the NRL have after failing to adequately deter another concussion on Thursday night?

Peter V’landys has revealed how he feels about AFL, calling it a ‘boring’ sport. Picture: Getty Imags.

WAKE ME UP, I’M IN HEAVEN

With a delicious swipe, ARL Commission chairman Peter V’landys continues to rattle the cage of Victorians and their chief sport, Aussie rules.

The delight is it takes so little for their delicate sensibilities to be enraged.

V’Landys told Matthew Johns’s new show on Fox Sports, Face To Face, that he found AFL “boring”, saying “I’ve never been a fan … I just can’t get enthused on it and that’s just me”.

Asked what he would prefer if given a choice between AFL and rugby union, V’Landys said: “I’d rather watch The Flintstones”.

His thoughts were perfectly reasonable, something every non-AFL follower can relate to, but gee didn’t it upset a few down south.

Showing their boneheaded logic, most accepted it as a personal attack and immediately launched a rearguard attack.

The irony is that for anybody who watched the show, V’Landys’ quotes were not anywhere near as inflammatory or mean-spirited as the quotes Johns dug up from AFL figures, like Jeff Kennett and Eddie McGuire, towards V’Landys.

Yet the Little Aussie Doer gets on with the job of rebuilding rugby league, rattling the AFL in the process.

Wake me up, I’m in heaven.

V’landys is what the game has been waiting for far too long — somebody to take the fight back to the AFL.

For years the NRL sat idly by doing nothing as AFL encroached on NRL heartlands with a softly, softly approach that both codes could coexist, when all along AFL plans to one day eliminate NRL completely.

V’Landys has recognised the Trojan horse strategy for what it is.

Originally published as Blurred lines around concussion rules and penalties prove NRL is failing to protect players