I agree. It's a very grey area. My biggest concern is all this foul play in the tackle from defenders. The ball often comes out with quite some force and a knock on is given when clearly it's been stripped out. It's so difficult to enforce rules when there are 3 or 4 in the tackle all with their hands on the ball trying to prevent the offload. There was a cover photo on one of this years issues of League Express that illustrated it perfectly. My Dad said of it at the time ''what chance have you got if the ball becomes loose in tackles like that?''.

Ba-dum-bum-tish!

Well seeing as we are havingg the new league structure. Can we change it back.

Well ok he's my thoughts on what I'd change

1.Bring back the shoulder charge.

2. Right a big one that means The NRL AND SL coming together and drawing up one set of common rules, discipline and marketing ideas.

3. With the introduction of the new league system, after the first round of games we then go into a month of international games, this to help the games appeal and also giving the teams time to sort out season tickets, and marketing for the second half of the season.
This mid season month consists of ENGLAND, IRELAND, SCOTLAND, WALES, FRANCE AND ITALY playing a 6 nations.
This is also where point 2 comes into play, the NRL shuts down for a month to play SOO, European based players are released to play 6N
The KIWIS, SAMOA, FIJI, TONGA, PNG AND COOK ISLANDS play 6 nations too and any remaing nations can set up a 6 way tournament USA, RUSSIA etc.

I'd have an end of season Europe, Polynesian and Oz tournament, with both 6N used as the selection process for Europe and Poly Isles with SOO the selection for Oz team.

Possibly add a 4th team REST OF THE WORLD, to help development and appeal.

All good suggestions. I would go for:

1. Away shirts should be outlawed. In the event of a colour clash, the team with the most attractive players (as determined by Nigel Wood) should be ordered to play topless under standard shirts vs skins rules.
2. Alter the referee's head cam so that it can deliver a short blast of intense light into the face of any penalised player that is complaining to the referee, hence blinding them temporarily. Then immediately restart the game with the heaviest member of the attacking team running directly at the blinded defender, whose teammates aren't allow to tackle the attacker.
3. Once the defensive line is broken, allow any person wearing the defending teams official replica jersey to enter the field of play to stop the attacking side.
4. Shoulder charges should be penalised.

A serious one, no ' secondary tackling ' if more than 1 tackler is involved

Ie, once you have effected a tackle ie say around the midrift of a player , once you release that grip, you are not allowed to touch the player again, no secondary grabbing, no grabbing of boot, not even pushing as in touching the player as he regains his feet and plays the ball, instant penalty, I know this would instantly retire Danny Buderus but it would it would speed up the game

How about turning the home kit inside out, that what we had to do as kids.

Quarters. Extra ad break for the tv companies, breaks up the game at a time when a team can run away with it which would keep the game closer

I was being serious too

A little historical aside...

originally in rugby, you didn't get points for a try at all...it was indeed a 'try' - that is, your reward for grounding the ball over the line was to have a free attempt at kicking a goal - the only way you got points.

On a slightly serious note why do people want to speed up the game any more? Half the problems come with players trying to slow it down as the 10 meter rule makes it very dificult to get on side. The only thing that will happen if we take kicking out of the game is to turn all players into the same size & shape. We also have a problem that the game is becoming too predicable 6 plays & kick with little variation in play it is starting to get one dimentional.
I would make it the duty of a player in attack or defence to keep the ball in play so diving to the ground that is coached nowadays (winning the floor) should be rightly punished as a voulantry tackle as it is just as bad as hand on the ball in the ruck.

1 and 2 I agree with fully.

3 is a complete non-starter. What do the non-international/SoO SL and NRL players do during this shutdown month? Who would want a break from watching SL and NRL to then watching the Kiwis and England coast through their respective competitions against mostly part-time players. Mid-season RL international tournaments are a long, long way off. Ireland, Scotland and Italy don't even have a semi-pro club team, cobbling together a group of players because of dodgy eligibility rules would not have the appeal that you suggest it would.

The emerging nations, and more specifically the grassroots and club game in the emerging nations needs years of development before any sort of mid-season international tournament on either side of the globe would have any sort of appeal. It simply does not work when one side is far superior to the others and the outcome is a forgone conclusion before it's even started.