Coaches blast ARL commission decision to ban shoulder charge

RUGBY league's leading coaches, including Wayne Bennett, Geoff Toovey and Ricky Stuart, have condemned the decision to outlaw the shoulder charge.

RUGBY league's leading coaches, including Wayne Bennett, Geoff Toovey and Ricky Stuart, have condemned the ARL Commission's brazen decision to outlaw the shoulder charge.

A season of ugly incidents convinced the commission to stamp out the controversial tackle - whether it is high or not - from next year.

Like the long-standing law in rugby union, any shoulder charge will now earn an immediate penalty at all levels of the game.

And as always, any shoulder charge that makes contact with the head will be severely dealt with by the match review committee.

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ARLC football operations director Nathan McGuirk made the recommendation to ban the tackle at a board meeting in Sydney yesterday.

"It won't be a decision that everyone agrees with, but it will be one that is in the best interests of player safety," McGuirk said.

"It was a decision made on fact rather than emotion."

Shoulder charge NRL

Those facts came from a lengthy review from Brian Canavan, in which every tackle from the 2012 season was analysed. Canavan found the size of players in the last decade had grown significantly and that the average G-force of shoulder charges were 76 per cent greater than a conventional head-on tackle.

Despite the findings, leading coaches were bewildered and bemused by the new rule they must now have to come to terms with.

"Surely there are more important things for the game to be worried about," Toovey said yesterday.

"I don't understand it. Someone on the commission has a fixed view on it. There has not been enough consultation with the players and coaches who have to live with it. We've got a rule that says it is illegal to hit someone in the head. Isn't that enough?"

McGuirk said the 16 NRL clubs had been consulted but "we didn't receive much feedback".

Bennett said he felt harsher penalties for contact with the head would've been a greater deterrent - something the commission introduced ahead of last season's finals with shoulder charges referred directly to the judiciary.

"I was consulted and I was in favour of maintaining it," the Knights coach said.

"It's a point of difference for us. It can be an exciting tackle and it can excite the fans. The dangerous throws have been eliminated from the game because the penalties are so severe that the players don't use them. A shoulder charge could've been in the same category.

"There are lots of shoulder charges in games that we don't recognise, where players use their shoulder to protect themselves. They don't make any connection with the head. The one that sticks out when (Chris) Sandow tried to put a shoulder charge on Greg Inglis. That's spectacular."

Shoulder charge - Twitter reaction

Stuart was stunned rugby league was following the same path as rugby union.

"I'm disappointed because collision is a unique part of our game," the new Eels coach said. "We all shake our heads when it happens in rugby and now it is going to happen in our great game. I thought we had bigger things to worry about. Can someone tell me the salary cap and draw for next year? I want to know who we're playing in round one."

The rule won't make a huge difference to the game, with Canavan finding that only 0.05 per cent of tackles made in 2012 were from shoulder charges. But Sharks coach Shane Flanagan, who saw centre Ben Pomeroy rubbed out for two matches during the finals series, is concerned about the referee's definition of shoulder charge.

"It really needs to be defined," he said. "Has he turned sideways into him? Is he wrapping his arms? We need to be really clear on what's not allowed."

McGuirk has proposed that "a defender who runs at a ball carrier and without attempting to tackle, grab or hold the ball carrier using arms or hand, charges to make direct physical contact with the shoulder or with the upper is guilty of misconduct".

That is set to be ratified at the commission's next board meeting in December.

In the meantime, the ARLC will negotiate with England's governing body and other member nations of the Rugby League International Federation to ensure the move is mirrored at all levels.