Hawkeye is not infallible. Having an oddly shaped ball often being obscured by the 27 men running on a very large pitch would make the placing of many high speed cameras rather impractical.

Im not proposing Hawkeye, im saying Hawkeye as a system, which whilst not infallible is less fallible than the human eye, can judge a much more complex rule such as LBW then there should be no problem with a system which can judge forward passes.

They could easily do forward passes on Sky. They can attach parrallel lines to pitches and this makes camera angles irrelevant.

But my suggestion is still the best. When the ball is thrown forwards it explodes killing the player that receives it. They won't do it again.

I thought the one for the Richards try wasn't as bad as made out. Probably plenty more in every game in SL that will go unpunished.

I only get annoyed when it's clear the forward pass is what made the try, like the gap wouldn't have been created if it was a flat or backwards pass, or the outside man clearer over ran his inside player.

That wouldn't help in the slightest. For one the ball doesn't follow a perfect, straight, horizontal path as it is passed. Secondly the cameras would still be unable to distinguish where the ball is relative to these lines, and thirdly (and most importantly), the ball can travel forward relative to the pitch.

Trust me, with the technology Sky have, they can rule on forward passes. Forward passes are basic geometry and it can easily be calculated. They can take the effect of camera angles into account and work it out. They probably haven't looked at it yet, but its definitely possible. It would be very easy for example to have a line perpendicular to the touch lines following the ball carrier, when he passes they can see which side of the line it's on. Easy for someone with Sky's technology to do.

The thing is though that it shouldn't be needed. If we had any competent officials they would see them. Are the touch judges there today honestly saying they didn't see that forward pass for Wigan's first in the second half? It's horrendous, leaving the hands at a 45 degree angle towards the try line. It was similar to the one they scored against Saints bar the fact a Leeds hand got to it. But the officials couldn't see that?

LBW would be considerably less complicated. A cricket ball will only travel at most 2 metres up and down, 1 metre side to side, and the 22 yards along the pitch. The Hawkeye cameras have to only watch a small volume, while some computers can then calculate the trajectories and where the ball would most likely end up had it not hit the leg pad.

In rugby you would have to increase the volume that hawkeye-style cameras must watch by a factor of a thousand. And then it would have to figure out loads of other things like how fast the player was moving when he passed it, the exact moment of the passing action, whether wind affected the ball after it was inflight, in what direction the player was passing it...
Doing all this while the cameras probably can't even see the ball due to the mass of players around it would make it a tough job. I'm not saying it's impossible, but I don't think the specific technology currently exists to do this as accurately as is wanted by most spectators. Or at least it would be hugely financially unviable.

It's not as simple as you're making out. In a textbook situation, yes, it is basic geometry. But there are so many variables. Using some technology to superimpose digital lines on the pitch could be done, but that's no help when players can pass foward relative to the pitch due to them imparting their own forward velocity onto the ball

Please explain in relation to....

a) where you are sat/stood when said forward pass is given

b) where the touch judge is.

c) where the refereee is.

d) wether the match is on TV or not.

e) where the cameras, if there, are in relationship to said forward pass.

and finally

when you last had an eye test



Forward passes are probably , at times, some of the hardest decisions to make within a split second whilst a game is in progess.

Isn't that then an argument to check by video ref if it was a forward pass?

Why not just rule that, for televised games, given the available information (existing footage) if a pass [ulooks[/u forward in the build up to a try, then it is. That might rule out some pass which in reality might not have been but also allow the video ref to rule on the many more passes which clearly are. Instead of the current situation where the video ref cannot even rule on obvious forward passes.