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“Always illegal” NRL deny ‘crackdown’ | 02:35
The NRL’s worst high tackle offenders in 2025 have been laid bare amid the league’s harsh crackdown.
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Following a jarring weekend which saw 18 players sin binned and several more penalised for high tackles, NRL CEO Andrew Abdo denied there was no high shot crackdown.
“There’s been no policy shift. It’s always been illegal to tackle high and we’ve been sin-binning and penalising high tackles for the game going back decades,” Abdo said.
“We’ve been really consistent around this the last couple of years. We’re not going to apologise or take a backwards step for protecting players from head high shots.”
Abdo says clubs deserve their share of the blame for what he says is a 90 per cent increase on high tackles from this time last year.
But a closer look at the breakdown of penalties reveal that some clubs are much, much worse than others.
Below is a list of all teams in order of high tackle penalties committed this season, with the Titans topping the list.
Remarkably, they have committed 15 more high tackle penalties than the Warriors (3), who have the least.
Gold Coast Titans 18
Sydney Roosters 17
Wests Tigers 16
Brisbane Broncos 16
Manly Sea Eagles 15
Canterbury Bulldogs 12
Cronulla Sharks 10
Canberra Raiders 9
Newcastle Knights 9
NQ Cowboys 9
Penrith Panthers 8
Parramatta Eels 8
St George Illawarra Dragons 7
South Sydney Rabbitohs 6
Melbourne Storm 6
Dolphins 4
Warriors 3
“You have the Titans at 18 and then you go all the way to the bottom and you have the Warriors at three. That’s a significant gap in high tackle penalties,” NRL 360 co-host Braith Anasta said.
“Why do we think that is? Can we work it out at all by looking at this as to why the teams at the top are serial offenders and the teams at the bottom aren’t?”
“You have to look at the defence coaches at these clubs I guess and the Warriors coaches are probably doing a better job because they are playing good football and not belting people high,” veteran journalist Phil Rothfield replied.
“That’s a huge discrepancy,” Brent Read added.
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Anasta said he was surprised a couple of teams were so low.
“You look at the Storm there. The Storm are renowned for their wrestling with people quite critical of them at times but they are down the bottom,” Anasta said.
“Even Souths there. He’s not that technical as a coach and maybe he’s got his team quite disciplined in that area.”
Rothfield believes players aren’t coached to tackle high with rugby league legend Gorden Tallis agreeing.
“No (they aren’t coached to tackle high), but you can coach it out of them,” Tallis said.
“You can make sure that the players get their targets lower at training and the more repetitive work you do, the better chance there is of it not happening.”
The spate of penalties and sin bins have also led to another issue which has perhaps gone unnoticed this season.
Read pointed to a moment during the Sharks-Tigers clash on Sunday night when Cronulla winger Ronaldo Mulitalo seemed to play for a penalty after being collected high.
“The players and coaches need to take some repsonsibily here.
“We saw Ronalado Mulitalo on Sunday get the lighthest tap in the face and carried on like he was clouted. The players are feigning injury, they’re playing up whenever they get a light tap on the face I mean the players got to take some responsibility.
“I think we saw the right decision on Sunday when the video review looked at it and went play on but they shouldn’t have had to.
“Ronaldo is a great guy and amazing footballer. He doesn’t need to do that crap.
“It comes back to players and coaches taking some accountability and ownership of their own behaviour on the football field.
“This game is a tough game and we don’t want to become soccer where guys feign injuries.”
Anasta said that while he doesn’t agree with players feigning injury or playing up for penalties, it’s happening because “every other team is doing it”
“You can peel it back and say the only reason they’re doing it because the penalties are being blown every week and other teams are doing it so they do it.” Anasta said.
“There’s a reason for it. They’re not just starting to do it.”
