The always electric Super 14 competition is underway, and though it has been a scoring feast so far it looks like the denial of a try last weekend is one of the more debated moments of the season’s early weeks.
The Waratahs just barely got by the Sharks this past weekend–got by just by their fingertips, in fact. Late in the match, Sharks fullback Stephen Treblanche’s pass to unmarked teammate Ryan Kankowski was swatted away by Waratahs outside back Kurtley Beale, stopping a line break that was on its way to the white line. Beale earned a penalty and an enforced ten-minute rest for his troubles, but the Sharks camp believes a penalty try would have been more appropriate.
Renowned Australian rugby commentary site Green and Gold Rugby offers a useful discussion of the controversy, including some key points of law regarding both intentional knock-ons and penalty tries. Green and Gold’s insight regarding whether or not Beale truly robbed the Sharks of a sure five-pointer are helpful, but the site’s comments on when an intentional knock-on should be awarded raise a more general issue about the difficulty involved in assessing a penalty for a deliberate knock-on. As Green and Gold indicates, the law states:
A player must not intentionally knock the ball forward with hand or arm, nor throw forward.
If the knock-on is intentional, a penalty is awarded. If unintentional, of course, the result is a scrum. A big difference, even when the situation is not as dramatic as it was when Beale committed his knock-on. The law makes perfect intuitive sense, as swatting a ball away is a cynical offense that should be punished much more strictly than an accidental case of butterfingers. But there is one problem. It’s challenging enough for a referee to see everything on the park, even with the help of assistant referees. But the “intentional” wording requires a referee to see inside a players’ mind.
The Green and Gold discussion does a good job of mentioning some ways Beale’s intent might be judged, such as the position of his body, the motion of his arms, and his pursuit of the ball after the knock-on occurred. However, all of these indicators could be construed as ways to judge Beale’s acting ability as much as his legitimate intent, so the question remains: How does a referee judge a player’s intent? Few other laws are construed in the same manner. While intent might be used in a decision to award a yellow or red card, intent doesn’t seem to be a factor in awarding penalties for infractions like offsides, late tackles, and so forth.
So, regardless of how you view the Beale situation, our question is: Should referees really be in the mind-reading business? And if not, how do you judge a deliberate knock-on more empirically? By whether they got both hands to the ball? By body position?
It’s a tricky question, and one we’d rather ask than answer. Mull it over as you watch the below video, and please post a comment if you have a solution worked out!
Incidentally, Green and Gold also points out that there was a similar incident on the same weekend involving Will Chambers of the Reds where not even a penalty was awarded, as you can see here (we won’t comment on whether Chambers’ teammate Quade Cooper might have had sticky enough fingers to hang on to the football):
And if you’re not yet convinced that the deliberate knock-on issue is a bit murky, consider this referees’ discussion of another dubious example from 2008.
