What are the key elements and indicators of each offense? /

There are currently eight different type of offences that can be charged under the NRL Judiciary Code. Each offence has particular elements and indicators which are detailed as part of the NRL Judiciary Code and what actually constitutes an offence.

• High Tackle – Careless
• High Tackle – Reckless
• Shoulder Charge
• Crusher Tackle
• Dangerous Throw
• Striking
• Contrary Conduct
• Dangerous Contact (includes grapple tackles, tripping, chicken-wing tackles, hip drops, late contact with kickers, late contact after passing, cannonball tackles)

High Tackle – Careless

A Careless High Tackle is when a defending player makes forceful contact with the head or neck of an attacking player. The contact must be deemed careless, in that the defending player has failed in his duty of care.

What are the key indicators of this charge?

A careless high tackle generally sees the defending player attempting to make a genuine attempt at making a wrapping or grabbing tackle. The defender’s hand/s are generally open when making a wrapping type tackle.

The initial point of contact may not have been directly with the head or neck, however contact with the head or neck did occur during the tackle. However, the attempted tackle was made in the marginal target area, which is high around the upper chest and shoulders of the defending player.

At times, a careless high tackle may see the attacking player be impacted by another defender in the tackle which sees their height lowered when tackled.

High Tackle – Reckless

A Reckless High Tackle is when a defending player makes forceful contact with the head or neck of an attacking player. The high contact will be deemed reckless when a player foresees high contact before or during the action of a tackle and carries on with the tackle regardless of that risk. A player may “foresee” high contact when starting (or even during) a tackle even if he closes his eyes or looks away at the last moment.

What are the key indicators of this charge?

The defender is not attempting to make a genuine attempt at making a wrapping or grabbing tackle. The defender’s hand/s may be clinched in a fist. The defender’s arm may be swinging in an upwards direction. The attempted tackle was made in the marginal target area, which is high around the upper chest and shoulders of the defending player.

Shoulder Charge

A shoulder charge is where the tackling player uses his shoulder and/or upper arm without, at the same time, using both of his arms to tackle or otherwise take hold of the opposing player. Arms obviously includes hands. The contact and force must be generated by the shoulder of the tackling player. Unless both arms are used or attempted to be used, then in any case where the shoulder and/or upper are used to make forceful contact, it will be a shoulder charge.

What are the key indicators of this charge?

A shoulder charge and the contact made must be forceful. The key question is whether the defender attempted to use both arms in attempting to wrap in the tackle. At times, another defender may impact the ability for the defender to use both arms in the tackle (squeezed out). At times, defending players may make incidental contact with an attacking player by attempting to brace or absorb an impact, as opposed to generating a forceful contact themselves.

Crusher Tackle

It is in breach of the rules where a defending player, in or after effecting a tackle, uses any part of his body forcefully to bend or apply unnecessary pressure to the head, neck or spinal column of the tackled player. In some crusher tackles, the full weight of the defender is applied in a dropping motion on the tackled player’s head and/or neck and/or spinal column.

What are the key indicators of this charge?

There must be excessive flexion of the head, neck or spinal column during the tackle. A player may regrip or readjust during the tackle which does not allow for the release of the pressure on the attacking players head and neck. The contact was dangerous and unnecessary, giving the attacking player no opportunity to protect themselves. The defender didn’t provide any space for the attacker’s head to be free during the tackle.

Dangerous Throw

If a tackle of an opponent sees that player being lifted or elevated so that he is placed in a position where it is likely that the first part of his body to make contact with the ground will be his head or neck (“the dangerous position”), then that tackle or contact will be deemed to be a dangerous throw unless the dangerous position could not have been avoided.

What are the key indicators of this charge?

The tackled player must have been lifted or elevated off the ground during the tackle. The head of the tackled player must dip below his hips for the dangerous position to be reached. The tackled player must be placed into a dangerous position for this to be charged. If the attacking players position is arrested by the defender/s during the tackle and the dangerous position changed, this must be considered in whether to charge the defending player.

The charged player must have substantially contributed to the outcome of the dangerous throw to be charged. He doesn’t have to be solely responsible for the dangerous throw, but his contribution to the outcome must be deemed substantial. 

If the attacking player jumps or elevates themselves of the ground during the dangerous throw, the defending player should not be charged.

Striking

Striking is when a player strikes another player with forceful contact that is unfair, excessive and dangerous.

Striking is most commonly charged where one player deliberately punches another. The clearest cases of “striking” occur with a closed fist, but there may be an illegal striking with an elbow or another part of the body; for example, a “kneeing” may be a “striking”. Similarly, a deliberate or reckless “head-butt” will constitute a striking.

What are the key indicators of this charge?

The contact must be deemed as intentional or at least reckless. The contact made by the charged player must be forceful in nature.

Contrary Conduct

A player is guilty of Contrary Conduct if he behaves in a way that is contrary to the true spirit of the game. “The true spirit of the game” is defined as a spirit of sportsmanship and fair play in the course of a vigorous sporting contest.

What are the key indicators of this charge?

It is not possible to give any detailed list of the indicators of this type of offence, but it could include a variety of things such as spitting at another player, making avoidable contact with the referee, foul and abusive language and so on.

Dangerous Contact

The offence of Dangerous Contact is constituted by carelessly, recklessly or intentionally making dangerous contact with an opposing player. To be regarded as “dangerous" for the purposes of the offence, the conduct must have involved an unacceptable risk of injury to the opposing player, and players have a special duty to avoid such contact.

The contact need not have occurred in the context of a player effecting or attempting to effect a tackle. Indeed, Dangerous Contact may be charged in a variety of circumstances. For example, and without intending to be exhaustive, it will be applied in the case of wrestling holds or grapples of any kind, twisting of the limb or limbs of a tackled player, head slams, dangerous kick charge-downs, raised knee in the tackle incidents, players in possession leading with their forearm or elbow.

What are the key indicators of this charge?

There are many different types of incidents and misconduct that are charged under this offence including the following which we now provide greater detail on:

• Chicken wing tackles
• Grapple tackles
• Hip drops
• Late contact with kickers
• Late contact after passing
• Tripping
• Cannonball tackles

Chicken wing tackles

A torsion/flexion of limbs (chicken wing) is a breach of the code where a player uses any part of his body to forcefully twist, bend or apply pressure to a limb or limbs of an opposing player in a way that involves an unacceptable risk of injury to that player. A defending player will be charged with this offence if the limb or limbs of the attacking player are moved in an abnormal direction or outside the usual ranges of movement.

What are the key indicators of this charge?

The limb must be taken past its normal range of movement with the contact by the defending player. The defender may have placed dangerous pressure on the limb to place the attacker to gain an advantage or control the tackle. The contact must be deemed as unnecessary and avoidable.

Grapple Tackles

It is in breach of the rules where a defending player, in or after effecting a tackle, uses any part of his body forcefully to bend or apply unnecessary pressure to the head, neck or spinal column of the tackled player. These are tackles where force is applied to the head, neck and/or spinal column of the tackled player to slow down the play-the-ball, or to intimidate the tackled player. 

A tackler making any contact with the head or neck of the tackled player has a duty to avoid that contact, and should any unavoidable contact occur the tackler is required to immediately release the tackled player from any grip or hold around the head or neck or pinning of the head/neck.

What are the key indicators of this charge?

There must be force applied in the tackle to either the head or neck of the tackled player. The head or neck of the tackled player may be forced into a vulnerable and dangerous position by this contact. The defending player may have had the opportunity to release the grip on the tackled player but choose not to release it. The contact that is made with the head and neck could have been avoided and was unnecessary. 

Hip Drops

A hip drop tackle is where a defending player in joining or committing a tackle, drops or uses their own body weight to apply pressure to an opponent’s legs in such a way as to constitute an unacceptable risk of injury to the tackled player, this will constitute Dangerous Contact. 

This type of conduct will include instances where a defending player drops their weight through their hips or through any other part of their body on to an opponent’s leg/s and in doing so places them in a vulnerable position. The concern about this type of action is that it traps, twists, and contorts muscles, tendons and joints in lower limbs in an unnatural way exposing the ball carrier to an elevated risk of injury.

What are the key indicators of this charge?

The defending player will generally have a grip of the opposition player, using that grip to lift or maintain body weight to then drops or swings their hip/s around (this drop/swing starts to look unnatural on football field). 

The defender usually swivels their nearest hip away from the body, aiming their bottom or hip at the opposition player's body and lower limbs. The defender lands their body weight on the lower leg/s to stop the opposition players momentum, trapping the lower limb into a dangerous position with weight and force.

The following sets out the key indicators whether a charge is to be considered:

1. Grip – the defending player has a grip on the attacking player (one hand or two)
2. Rotate – the defending player uses that grip and swings or rotates their body to a position behind or to the side of the ball carrier
3. Drop – the defending player then drops their body weight directly onto the attacking player's legs (as opposed to their body weight landing on the ground first to absorb most of the impact) 

Late contact with kickers

It will be conduct in breach of the rules where, in the course of a charge-down (or an attempted) of a kick in the course of play or placing pressure in the kicker, the defending player makes dangerous contact with the kicking player. The special duty which is imposed on players to avoid dangerous contact to an opposing player is particularly important where a kicking player is in a position of physical vulnerability. Such vulnerability will arise where, at the time of the contact the kicking player is in the act of kicking the ball and has either one or both feet off the ground or where he is otherwise off balance.

What are the key indicators of this charge?

One possible indicator of an offence of dangerous contact arising from contact with a kicker is where the contact is impermissibly late, and/or not directed at the football, or in other words, where it is clear that the charging player was never likely actually to stop the ball being kicked away and just aimed to make contact with the kicker whilst he was off balance or was otherwise vulnerable.

In this context, the contact will be deemed to be impermissibly late, and therefore dangerous, where the charging player makes contact when the kicker is not in possession of the ball, that is, after the ball has left the kicking player’s foot.

Other possible indicators of such an offence are where in attempting to charge down a kick, the charging player throws himself in front of the kicker, or at the kicker’s leg.

Late contact with passers

Where an attacking player who has passed the football is placed into a position of particular physical vulnerability, the defending player has a special duty to avoid forceful and dangerous contact with the attacking player. After a player has passed the football, they generally do not expect to have forceful contact made by a defending player. Any forceful contact that places an attacking player at an unnecessary risk of being injured after they have passed the ball may be charged with this offence.

What are the key indicators of this charge?

The contact must be made to player who was not in possession of the ball. It must be assessed whether the defending player could have avoided making the contact to the player who had passed the ball. The contact that was made must have an unacceptable risk of injury to the attacking player. The attacking player must have had no ability to protect himself during this contact. It must be assessed whether the defender was not obstructed in their view of the player having already passed the ball.

Tripping

A trip takes place where a player who does not have a grip on an opposing player places his leg or foot in such a position that the opposing player makes contact with it. It is immaterial whether the player who was tripped fell to the ground or was otherwise substantially impeded. The trip must have been an intentional action by the defender or at least reckless. 

What are the key indicators of this charge?

There must have been contact by either the leg or the foot by the defending player to the tackled player. The conduct by the charged player must have been at least reckless, in that they foresaw that contact may occur by carried on regardless of that risk. The defending player must not have a grip or a hold of the tackled player for a trip to occur.

Cannonball tackles

Where an attacking player gets or is put into a position of particular physical vulnerability, the defending player has a special duty to avoid forceful and dangerous contact with the other player.

Where a defending player, in joining in the tackle of a player who is already being held in an upright position by another defender or defenders, makes initial contact below, around or above the knee or knee joints of the tackled player in such as a way as to constitute an unacceptable risk of injury to the tackled player, this will constitute Dangerous Contact (Cannonball Tackle).

What are the key indicators of this charge?

The initial point of contact must be assessed, but even if the initial contact is above the knee or knee joint this type of tackle can be considered dangerous and potentially charged. The attacking player being placed into a position of vulnerability where they have no ability to protect themselves must also be considered.

A key consideration is whether the contact caused the knee or knee joint into a position or direction outside of it’s normal range of movement.