Cronulla NRL players Andrew and David Fifita should be banned from the NRL for 12 months if allegations they abused a rugby league match official are proven correct, former grand final referee Bill Harrigan says.
It is alleged the twin brothers physically and verbally threatened three young match officials after an A-grade game at Glenwood on Saturday.
An incident report obtained by the ABC yesterday said David Fifita was acting as a trainer and allegedly said to the referee "you're a f****** disgrace mate" and when he failed to stop the verbal abuse, the match official began to record the incident on his mobile phone.
This prompted David Fifita's brother Andrew to allegedly walk into a roped off area and say "delete that now or I'll smash you" before charging towards the referee with numerous people intervening to hold him back.
The alleged incident is the subject of an investigation by Sharks management, with the NRL asserting they would take a zero tolerance approach towards abuse of referees by first grade players.
David Fifita was said to be upset after the referee did not stop play for an injured player.
Speaking on Triple M, Harrigan, who refereed 10 grand finals, 21 State of Origin fixtures and 22 Test matches, said the Fifita brothers needed to be made an example of, if they were found guilty.
"It should be a long time out of the game," Harrigan said.
"Because that's what they are saying about anyone out there approaching referees, and trying to retain young referees over the abuse they all cop.
"To cop it from a first grader to say 'I'll smash you'... to me it has to be rubbed out to set an example, rubbed out for 12 months."
NRL losing young referees due to crowd abuse
Harrigan said retaining young referees continued to be a problem for the NRL because of the poor treatment they receive."Out there at park football where these young referees don't have any security like first graders do, they walk to their cars, or their mums and dads are picking them up they shouldn't be fearing, they shouldn't be worrying about people coming up to them and abusing them," he said.
"Every time you see someone coming up to you, you start to feel intimidated or panic about it, you start to think is this bloke going to have a go at me.
"If two footballers walked up to you, first grade footballers that are well known and they say something which was something in a derogatory way, well then there has to be a heavy punishment because they are setting an example to the mums and dads out there."
Yesterday, Penrith District Rugby League Association president Phil Haines said that in the past year he had lost more than 30 match officials because of crowd abuse.
NSW Premier Mike Baird condemned the alleged behaviour and said he supported the NRL in investigating the incident.
"Our junior refs and many sporting groups do a great job on a weekly basis and we should do everything we can to protect and support them," Mr Baird said.
"I think the behaviour, obviously reported, is behaviour you wouldn't want to see from anyone let alone the senior representatives in the sport of rugby league itself."
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