{"id":511497,"date":"2026-03-01T09:37:08","date_gmt":"2026-03-01T09:37:08","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/511497\/"},"modified":"2026-03-01T09:37:08","modified_gmt":"2026-03-01T09:37:08","slug":"todd-payten-criticises-refs-for-lack-of-consistency-scott-drinkwater-injury-update-tom-mikaele-injury-cannonball-tackle-rugby-league-news","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/511497\/","title":{"rendered":"Todd Payten criticises refs for lack of consistency, Scott Drinkwater injury update, Tom Mikaele injury, cannonball tackle, rugby league news"},"content":{"rendered":"

Cowboys coach Todd Payten has been left disappointed by the lack of action from the officials after a dangerous tackle resulted in a serious injury to NQ prop Tom Mikaele. <\/p>\n

Watch all three games of Rugby League in Las Vegas live and ad-break free during play is Fox League, available on Kayo | New to Kayo? Join now and get your first month for just $1.<\/a><\/p>\n

Mikaele was injured in a cannonball tackle from Knights star Tyson Frizell. A cannonball is an illegal tackle that occurs when a defender tackles the legs of a vulnerable attacking player who is being held up by other defenders.<\/p>\n

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Frizell was penalised for the action but wasn\u2019t reprimanded further. <\/p>\n

In Payten\u2019s eyes, that wasn\u2019t sufficient, with the Cowboys coach also referencing the high shot on Knights star Kalyn Ponga which resulted in a Braidon Burns sin bin. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m really disappointed with how the Tom Mikaele incident was handled,\u201d Payten said in his post-match press conference.<\/p>\n

\u201cConsidering you know, Kalyn gets up and plays on and Tom\u2019s out for the next six weeks.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019d just like a bit of consistency, but we\u2019ll see what happens through the week.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt (Mikaele\u2019s injury) did hurt us. We had to use four interchanges prior to halftime even though the plan was to use three.\u201d<\/p>\n

Crichton lucky to avoid the bin? | 00:33<\/p>\n

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The offender Frizell was asked about the tackle post-game, stressing there was zero intent to injure. <\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not too sure I\u2019ll leave that with them. It\u2019s unfortunate as it\u2019s not something you want to see happen to a player and there was no intent to hurt him in any way,\u201d Frizell said.<\/p>\n

\u201cI hope he\u2019s all right and we\u2019ll just see what happens.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mikaele wasn\u2019t the only Cowboy who picked up an injury.<\/p>\n

Early in the first half, star fullback Scott Drinkwater walked off the field with a rib cartilage issue but returned to the game.<\/p>\n

Drinkwater finished the game but it was obvious he wasn\u2019t his blistering self. <\/p>\n

\u201cHe had to get needled. He\u2019ll be sore,\u201d Payten said.<\/p>\n

\u201cGiven the nature of rib cartilage injries, you can needle that. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019ve got two weeks before we play again. I don\u2019t know the severity of the cartilage damage, but it\u2019s certainly inhibited and affected his flow and rhythm.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Cowboys coach Todd Payten has been left disappointed by the lack of action from the officials after a…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":511498,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[2095,64,63,256268,256266,256265,37359,763,19972,2623,2627,2041,2067,4873,668,256267,159,30384,1085,85,777,1083,4573,2614],"class_list":{"0":"post-511497","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-america","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-cannonball-tackle","12":"tag-cowboys-press","13":"tag-criticises-refs","14":"tag-dangerous-tackle","15":"tag-fox-league","16":"tag-injury-update","17":"tag-las-vegas","18":"tag-nevada","19":"tag-north-america","20":"tag-northern-america","21":"tag-post-match-press-conference","22":"tag-press-conference","23":"tag-rib-cartilage-issue","24":"tag-rugby-league","25":"tag-rugby-league-news","26":"tag-scott-drinkwater","27":"tag-sports","28":"tag-todd-payten","29":"tag-tom-mikaele","30":"tag-tyson-frizell","31":"tag-united-states-of-america"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/511497","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=511497"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/511497\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/511498"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=511497"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=511497"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=511497"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}