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Should Klein have put the whistle away during prelim final?
SEN • September 27th, 2025 2:31 pm
Scott Sattler and Adrian Proszenko have called into question why Ashley Klein blew his whistle so often during Friday night’s preliminary final between the Melbourne Storm and Cronulla Sharks.
In the Storm’s 22-14 win over the Sharks, the referee called 18 penalties during the match, with the majority of those occurring within the first half.
This led Sharks coach Craig Fitzgibbon to question why the whistle was blown so frequently and thus resulting in less time of the match being played.
“I’m not sooking about the ref, the better side won today,” he said said post-game.
“But I think the first half had 22 minutes of ball in play.
“Like, what are we doing for a prelim?”
Following up on this on SEN’s Saturday League Kick-Off, Sattler noted the high amount of penalties, with Proszenko highlighting the disparity between this penalty count and the ones in previous prelims and Grand Finals.
Sattler: “We hate talking about it, but 18 penalties?”
Proszenko: “So, since 2020, the average for preliminary finals or the variance has been between five and 13 and when it comes to the last couple of Grand Finals, it has been five and seven penalties.”
“So that’s a lot of penalties, and we just want to see the teams played, don’t we?
“We want to see it go back and forth, and it takes fatigue out of the game as well, which is what you want to see in the game in this time of year.
“So, Craig Fitzgibbon was fairly measured in what he said, but he made a good point; they weren’t able to play.”
Sattler and Proszenko are not the only ones who have called Klein’s umpiring decisions into question in recent times.
Earlier in the week, before the referees for the preliminary final were announced, Corey Parker raised questions about whether he should be umpiring the upcoming Grand Final, citing his performances during this finals series.
“It would be interesting to see who gets the refereeing gig for the Grand Final,” Parker said on SENQ Breakfast.
“Klein is definitely one of them. We will find out the refs for the prelims soon.
“Klein, you can provide an argument to suggest he shouldn’t be referee.
“I think some of his decisions have not been where they need to be. If we’re picking pepper out of fly s--t for who is gonna be referee (for the Grand Final), I don’t think he’s in front, that’s all.”
