'Work to be done': Panthers coach Ivan Cleary fumes over 'disturbing' match review committee issues

Panthers coach Ivan Cleary has taken aim at the "disturbing" issues surrounding the NRL match review committee, with the reigning premiers set to be without one of their most experienced players for the next fortnight due to suspension.

News surfaced last week that the ARL Commission would look at taking matters into their own hands when it came to judicial matters moving forward.

The mid-season alteration didn't go down with the RLPA, who released a statement over the weekend describing it as "an unprecedented overreach of extra judicial power".

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Those sentiments were echoed by Cleary during his usual Tuesday press conference, where he was quizzed about the looming changes to the judiciary system.

He admitted there was "danger" surrounding the move.

"We had a charge there on the weekend that I was very disappointed with," he said.

"The danger there is that the Commission is not showing a lot of confidence in the MRC.

"I don't know if that's the actual reason, but you can assume that … which is a little disturbing. I think that's probably the main issue - do we have confidence in the MRC?

"If we don't, we should probably fix that up rather than trying to come up with an 'oh, we will step in if we don't think it's right' … there's some work to be done."

The incident coach Cleary was referring to involved Scott Sorensen during his side's win on the road against the Warriors on Saturday afternoon.

The back-rower dragged Dallin Watene-Zelezniak to the turf at Go Media Stadium in a tackle that wasn't penalised at the time, but was later placed on report.

Then, after Watene-Zelezniak left the field with an ankle injury, Sorensen was slapped with a grade two dangerous contact charge for a hip drop.

The 32-year-old will miss two matches as a result, and Cleary was less than pleased.

"I think it was very hard done by," he said.

"There's been enough talk about hip drops this year, you've heard enough coaches post-game [that are] confused. The actual hip drop rule, I don't even know who wrote it, I don't know when it was written - it's very vague, it's nothing like why it was brought in.

"Scott made a tackle that is, in most people's eyes, a classic rugby league tackle.

"No one saw it, even the player tackled didn't think anything of it. Not a referee, not a touchjudge, not 18,000 fans - but someone got hurt, so we had to do a cold case and go back and try and find it. It's definitely something that needs to be looked at.

"Just because someone gets an ankle injury doesn't mean someone has to be suspended. If we don't want anyone to get injured and we want to suspend everyone for that to happen, there are accidents, and I certainly believe that was an accident."

Asked whether the club decided to take an early guilty plea as opposed to fighting the charge against Sorensen, the champion coach offered a wry smile and short response.

"That would be one way to put it," Cleary said.

Penrith will face the ladder-leading Bulldogs in a blockbuster Thursday night clash.