NRL Head of Football Graham Annesley addressed Jason Demetriou's concerns from the Bulldogs game on the weekend at his weekly briefing.
After Saturday's game against the Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs, Demetriou believed his club was treated unfairly in the ruck.
Annesley spoke about the issue, and surprisingly the Rabbitohs enjoyed quicker play the balls in the ruck than their opposition.
โThe number of times there are extra efforts or a push on the ground or working their way around the tackle, all the things that we say we want to speed the game up for and people say they want a faster game, but consistently we're getting controlled slower in the ruck,โ Demetriou said after the game.
โOur ruck is consistently slower than anyone else, and it's not like we're fighting for it.โ
The Head of Football revealed that Souths had an average play-the-ball speed of 3.29 seconds, compared to the Bulldogs' 3.94 seconds, perย Fox Sports.
โThe Rabbitohs delayed the Bulldogs' play the ball beyond four seconds on 39.2 per cent of occasions.
"The Bulldogs delayed the Rabbitohs' play the balls to over four seconds on 26 per cent of the occasions,โ Annesley said.
โWe've got an obligation to have a look at these things when they're raised.
โI can understand the emotion of a game and comments based on what we all think we observed during the course of the game, but in case the facts and the stats just don't back it up.โ
Annesley also had no issues from the game between the Wests Tigers and Cronulla Sharks regarding Tommy Talau. After being awarded a try, the bunker called the decision back, with Talau dropping the ball into Nicho Hynes' hands.
