Cronulla coach Ricky Stuart today reignited grapple-mania by claiming NRL premiers Melbourne have gone back to old ways of wrestling players around the head.
Stuart claims the NRL has eased off policing of grapple tackles lately, enabling the Storm to go back to controversial wrestling techniques which he believed contributed to the ill feeling in their win over St George Illawarra at Olympic Park last night.
"The month or six week period where the referees are jumping on top of it is over," Stuart told Sydney radio 2KY.
"Now they're (Melbourne) back into it again and it's coming into the most important stage of the season.
"There's a technique on how they attack the head and they're getting away with it again.
"I'm a big advocate of keeping away from the player's head.
"We don't coach it, we don't train it. I, like any coach, will do as much as you have to do to win but I won't wrestle a player around the head.
"It's just not good for the game, it's not good for kids to see... but we've all of a sudden gone lenient on it again with Melbourne.
"I'll put my chin out there again (by speaking out) to get it whacked but someone has to do it because it shouldn't be in the game."
Stuart was also highly critical of the performance of referee Gavin Badger last night after he sent off Dragons prop Jason Ryles for kicking the leg of a player in the scrum in the 25th minute.
The incident came only two minutes after the brawl and Ryles was reacting to having his foot trampled on by a Storm player.
The send off has been widely condemned as a hasty decision which robbed the Dragons any chance of upsetting the Storm.
"It was unnecessary and nowhere near a send-off report," said Stuart.
"The thing you've got to look at now is how embarrassing it's going to be when they (NRL match review committee) let him off for a send-off decision.
"They (St George Illawarra) lost the opportunity to win the game ... what happened last night was a joke."
