The NRL has contacted Mitchell Moses and issued him a formal warning for his conduct with the referees on Easter Monday, telling the Eels halfback he must remain civil when speaking to officials in his captaincy capacity from now on.
The halfback made light, non-aggressive contact with Peter Gough more than once during the match, which the NRL has since reviewed. The league’s bosses weren’t happy with the actions.
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It was also noted that the way Moses spoke to leading official Gough, as well as how he let his team act after certain decisions, was not up to standard.
Capping the formal notice was a note that Moses is regularly spotted treating referees and touchline judges the same way, and that the NRL wouldn’t hesitate to issue fines or even playing bans to the 31-year-old should it now continue beyond the warning.
The NRL world should be happy, considering Moses was nearly immediately dubbed “the game’s biggest whinger” after the match was decided by an offside penalty that allowed Jock Madden to kick a penalty.
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To Moses’ credit overall, he was quick to insist Parramatta didn’t lose the fiery 22-20 Easter Monday battle because of any officiating. He declared, “[the refereeing] is not why we lost… it’s got nothing to do with the ref,” and even flagged that Gough had helped him by telling him a decision was so clear-cut there was no reason to challenge.
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Beaten coach Jason Ryles echoed the sentiment after the two-point loss at CommBank Stadium. “They’ve got a hard job; they get put in some pretty high-pressure situations,” he said. “If we got the back-end of our first half right, we wouldn’t have had to worry about the ref.”
Moses and Parra return to action on Sunday, April 12, against the Gold Coast Titans.
