The RFL have announced three additions to their Match Review Panel with one of those additions crossing over to the Operational Rules Tribunal as well.
Rebecca Stevens, Steve Presley and former Warrington, Wigan and Catalans forward Jerome Guisset have all joined the RFL to take part in the disciplinary process, with the latter two primed to deal with on-field issues (MRP) and Stevens set to cross between on field and off-field (ORT).
This is part of the RFL’s attempt to diversify those who rule on and have a say about these disciplinary matters and Director of Operations ad Legal, Robert Hicks, announced their appointments.
“We did review who was on our ORT and MRP panels and we’ve recruited some additional members in order to improve the diversity of though across those panels,” Hicks stated.
“Probably the most noticeable to join the Operational Rules Tribunal is Rebecca Stevens, she’s a former GB Lioness who toured in the late 90’s and early 2000’s and she’s also a qualified barrister.
“She will join as a side member and will be really beneficial to the thought process on both on-field and off-field tribunals.
“In terms of the match review panel, one of the gaps that was identified was a lack of officiating knowledge in that room, so we’ve managed to recruit Steve Presley.
“He was a former Super League referee and player at professional level and recently worked with the match officials department so he’s not long out of the sport.”
The final addition was Jerome Guisset with the Frenchman having had a stellar career including 271 Super League appearances, notably making a total of 137 and 141 appearances for Warrington and Catalans respectively.
Hicks spoke of Guisset’s addition: “I think he really brings an air of modernity to that panel, he’s probably the most recently retired player to sit in there. He’s obviously a former French international, has played union and league and played not only in England and France but also the NRL.
“We really hoping that these three people will add some diversity of thought and challenge what goes on in there.”
