RFL to offer referees greater protection after Magic Weekend abuse from ‘keyboard warriors’
Chris Kendall
Rugby league’s Head of Match Officials has urged fans to remember “there is a person behind the shirt” after a fresh wave of criticism aimed at referees following Magic Weekend.
Phil Bentham has defended his top officials after Chris Kendall was subjected to more social media abuse after Leeds Rhinos’ fiery defeat to Warrington, which saw three players sin-binned as the Rhinos lost 24-6 to leave their playoff hopes hanging by a thread.
Bentham has revealed the RFL are exploring ways to offer referees greater protection online, with leading refs such as Kendall and Liam Moore opting to be active on social media despite being the target of some horrendous abuse.
“A fan came to me at the weekend and said: ‘It’s no wonder your referees get abuse with the state of some of your decisions’,” Bentham said of Magic Weekend.
“Chris made a really good point that he has a right as a human being to be on social media. That is the way the generation speaks to each other.
“He has a right to be on there without being abused. He doesn’t have to give in to the keyboard warriors which is 100 per cent right. Personally I wouldn’t be on there but they have every right to be on there and they have every right to be protected by us.
“If I watch football I have opinions on decisions made by the referees. What I don’t do is go on social media and talk about them and I certainly don’t go on and abuse people because they have made a certain decision.”
Bentham is back overseeing the RFL Match Officials department after a stint with the Premier League coaching their VAR officials. He has also revealed the remarkable detail that goes into each weekly refereeing review, describing claims that refs are not accountable for their mistakes as completely untrue.
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“Each referee will review their game minute by minute, decision by decision,” he said.
“What I want them to do then is to break it down into what are the key match decisions, what are the things that really influence this game?
“A decision that could be correct or a decision that they may have got wrong – they are the key match decisions. I want them to identify those and then tell me the story of the game. What work have you done with team A in the ruck area? What work have you done with team B in terms of communication to the players? What have you done on the 10m?
“We will then listen back to how they spoke to the players as to whether that was relevant to the situation. In the background we also have a reviewer who then does exactly the same from a coaching perspective.
“It is really forensic, and what we do then is have a meeting and look at appointments for the following week. We have to put the referees who are in form on the games that we think are suitable for those referees. We have to decide whether someone needs a week in the Championship to work on something.
“They are all accountable. Every single week they are all wondering ‘am I in Super League this week or am I not?’ That level of accountability happens week-in week-out.”
