Paul Kent: Phil Gould, Brad Fittler reaction to Karl Lawton tackle shows how much game has changed in 30 years

Brad Fittler once ended up in a similar predicament to what befell Cameron Murray. His coach, Phil Gould, recoiled in horror. They didn’t always think spear tackles were OK, writes PAUL KENT.

This happened in the good old days, apparently, when players ate nails for breakfast and shaved with a bowie knife, twice daily, damn the razor burn.

Back when the game wasn’t going soft.

It was 1992 and a young man named Brad Fittler took a run against the Brisbane Broncos when a pocket battleship named Alan Cann picked him up and turned him upside down and dumped him on his head, stars forming in Fittler’s eyes.

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It came to mind over the weekend when Fittler joined his coach from back then, Phil Gould, in the commentary box at Channel Nine and they reeled back in manly horror at the decision to send Karl Lawton off for a spear tackle.

Against the Rabbitohs on Friday night, Lawton picked up Cam Murray and turned him upside down, his momentum such that his own feet left the ground, and Murray landed on his shoulder and then quickly his head which prompted Gould to let burst a machine gun serenade of “oh dear, oh dear …”

“It’s a little bit of a flip but to be sent off for that, when there’s absolutely no injury to the other player, I find that extraordinary,” Gould said. “You want your prime time TV show to now be 12 on 13?

“If that’s your product, I give up.”

Fittler quickly supported his old coach.

“In support of Gus here,” he chirped. “I don’t think at any stage that deserved a send-off.”

The concern for the NRL is those comments being broadcast to the broader rugby league audience, from supposedly knowledgeable men, who know enough to have the audience questioning whether the game really is going soft, as they say, or whether those tackles are still acceptable in the game, which they were led to believe were not, or whether the game is competently officiated.

Surely these men know, they ask themselves.

Karl Lawton got four weeks.

Cameron Murray played on.

Regular fans knew it would be a send-off because that has been the way for years now. Those that don’t, either because they are new fans or simply the casual kind, and each group is the audience the NRL is looking to attract to grow the game, must have been confused at what they heard and saw.

Surely these two men, both highly decorated, and intelligent, must know if that is outside the rules or not.

That Gould and Fittler share more experience than all of us makes for a tough rebuttal.

Certainly Gould seemed aware of the broader responsibility to the game, which is when he referenced the effect of Lawton’s send-off, which he clearly thought would corrupt the contest.

Two points here: the NRL is still a sport before it is a television product, which should never be compromised, and there are rules to ensure fair play and safety that everybody must obey.

Most in the audience know the tackle in the modern game won’t see the player last the game, which was not always the case.

The first real change began in the 1990s when the game began being more professional as Tina Turner became responsible for bringing in an entire new audience.

And about here, in the dusty pages of history, is where the confusion for Gould and Fittler emerges.

Fittler was dumped on his head by Alan Cann in 1992.

They did not always think spear tackles were okay, which is odd as the game has moved heavily in the other direction, which is to get the spear tackle out of the game.

In 1992 Fittler was young, prodigious and earmarked for one of the great careers. The tragedy of that being robbed from Fittler was worth protecting, as it is in every young man.

Fittler was 20 when Cann dumped him upside down, on his head in a tackle that looked worse than Lawton’s, but marginally.

After the game he said his neck was sore.

“I saw stars,” he told the Sunday Mail. “It was the sort of tackle which can result in serious neck injuries.”

A couple of days later, after Cann was cleared, he said: “Most of the players agree it is time for some of the dangerous tackles to be cleared up.”

In a sign of the game’s slow shift to modern standards, Cann was somehow found not guilty at the judiciary.

Today, he would not be sighted again until August. Back then, with the Broncos whinging it was a Sydney agenda, Cann played the next weekend.

Phil Gould felt sick and buried his head after the Fittler tackle.

It was enough to prompt Gould into a statement.

“When he hit the deck I felt sick and buried my head in my arm on the sideline,” he said.

“I couldn’t bring myself to look again until our reserve grade coach Buck Rogers said Fittler was going to be okay.”

Gould then worried whether Cann’s lack of suspension would prompt an over-reaction the next time a player went to the judiciary for a spear tackle.

“If the bloke is guilty and deserves to get 10 weeks suspension, they’ll probably give him 20 weeks to make up for last time,” he said.

“That’s not what anybody wants to see even though the offence is the worst act of foul play imaginable.”

The worst act of foul play imaginable.

But times change, apparently.

Originally published as Paul Kent: Phil Gould, Brad Fittler reaction to Karl Lawton tackle shows how much game has changed in 30 years