Cummins has said that officials make decisions about forward passes on the basis of whether the passer's hands are pointing forward. If officials have effectively simplified the forward pass rule into something that is practical to make decisions on, why not make that the rule? In which case the video ref would be able to rule on forward passes.

There is no reason why the VR cannot be asked to rule on forward passes. There is no sensible argument why a RL VR can't achieve this, when a RU VR seemingly can.

If the VR is in doubt, or can't be sure, then BOD to the attacking team. What's hard about it?

They keep saying on Sky that it looks different from different angles. And? If one angle raises a serious doubt, then why is that a problem? It's not.

Magic Weekend vs Rhinos. Tansey Try from the penalty that shouldn't have been and the 20 metre offside decision that was missed. That was 2 refereeing decisions costing one team the match whilst handing it to the other.

Overall, I think that too often the inconsistencies in penalties is the difference between too many matches. I've tried my very best to be impartial as I can this season - I appreciate that no one is going to get every decision right for 80 minutes - but the "referee's interpretation" comes into play so much. I can only really cite Bradford games as examples as they're the ones I've been to, so:

Bradford vs Saints (Roby) - Plethora of penalties against Bradford in first 10 minutes for laying on. Player sin binned. Nothing really the other way.

London vs Bradford (Child) - Kaufusi horrendous head shot on Donaldson, knocking him out. Placed on report. Play stopped, penalty given. Later given 3 matches.

Bradford vs Catalans (Bentham) - Really fresh in the memory. This could be the only game of Rugby League I've ever seen where not one player has been offside throughout. It wasn't so much about what he gave (for the most part I thought he got the major calls right) but what he didn't.

I think moving to two referees is a brilliant idea. It's clearly too much for one man to watch for the defensive line being onside and making sure there is no interference/mistake at the play of the ball. A defensive ref and an attacking ref makes perfect sense.

I have often said that since referees went full time the standard of officiating has fallen. However, I cannot support your petition because I don't agree with some of your other points...

1. I don't think you can ask for change just because spectators come away from games questioning refs decisions - that will always happen come what may! (see next point on VRs). What you can complain about is the lack of consistency, and often inability to exercise much control over the game at all.

2. Use of video referee. I think that the VR is a waste of time for three reasons:

- It seems to have undermined referees willingness to make judgement calls on the field and their willingness to penalise players by using the sin-bin.

- I'd rather live with a 'human' error made on the spur of the moment than wait whilst the VR watches the 'action' over and over and still manages to make horrendous mistakes or the VR interferes during play.

- even if there weren't any poor VR decisions, you will never get the same grade of technology at every game because it will simply cost too much. So we will still have inconsistency.

Are you talking just in try scoring situations? Just those on TV or every game? I can see a situation where virtually every try scored would be referred to the VR, whichis not something I wish to see.

Rubbish. Leeds scored 42 points, presumably they were all Ganson's fault? None were defensive errors & penalties atributable to Bradford? Bradford only scored 38 points. Was Ganson responsible for all missed try & goal scoring opportunities? It's like accusing Ben Harris of directly costing Bradford the game because he failed to pass to a supporting Iestyn Harris 4 minutes into the game. There are thousnads of incidents that contribute to a game's final score, sadly it is the ones in the last few minutes or seconds that fans tend to focus on.

I'm a fan of 2 refs, but it is clearly not "too much" for one ref, otherwise how has the game worked this last century or so? I have never been aware of any ref having any difficulty in glancing at the defensive line at the appropriate moment and penalising offside and I'm surprised you suggest this. If this duty was "too much" for any individual then clearly that individual would not be up to the job.

I entirely agree, and said myself, that it was utterly ludicrous that Bentham never called an offside, but that was 100% clearly a decision he made, whether on instructions or not who knows, but without a shadow of a doubt there were some pretty disgusting offsides which on that particular day he made a policy decision to ignore, come what may.

Rubbish. Michael Withers' failure to touch a long floating pass occurred in the first half.....

It really wasn't. Look, dad, I know you like to be controversial, but one of the few givens in sport is that (a) Bradford lost and (b) had it not been for the phantom penalty and the missed offside, Bradford would 100% certainly have won. Cause, effect. Nail, head.

Just try scoring situations. In the same way that they don't go to the VR for every suspected knock on, but would if there was a suspected knock on in the build up to a try. There would have to be some suspicion that a pass is forward to justify going to the VR, just as there should be some suspicion of an infringement to justify going to the VR for any reason.

In view of the way that officials adjudicate on forward passes, looking at the direction of the passer's hands, there's no justification for exempting forward passes from VR decisions.

Just those on TV or every game? I can see a situation where virtually every try scored would be referred to the VR, whichis not something I wish to see.

Love the Aus version; the ref gives his decision; the VR can then only overturn it if there is compelling evidence that the on-field ref is wrong.

I too wouldn't like to see everything going to the VR but the problem with passes like the blatant forward pass by Catalans is that presumably the ref has no doubt (he hasn't seen it, and his touchie hasn't queried it) so the problem is that such howlers would still be allowed to stand, if you rely on the ref self-referring to the VR. I agree it's less than satisfactory, but then I am of the firm view that we shouldn't have whole teams of officials at a SL game that as a unit can't see such a blatant forward pass between the lot of 'em. I still don't get that.