{"id":808803,"date":"2026-07-18T19:44:42","date_gmt":"2026-07-18T19:44:42","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/808803\/"},"modified":"2026-07-18T19:44:42","modified_gmt":"2026-07-18T19:44:42","slug":"its-just-not-right-seething-cook-unloads-on-officiating-in-stunning-dragons-claim","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/808803\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018It\u2019s just not right\u2019: Seething Cook unloads on officiating in stunning Dragons claim"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dragons skipper Damien Cook has unloaded on the officiating in a passionate press conference following his side\u2019s 20-12 loss to the Warriors<\/a>.<\/p>\n

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Cook believes the Dragons are too often on the wrong side of 50\/50 calls, raising that the team\u2019s spot on the ladder is contributing to how the club is refereed. <\/p>\n

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Against the Warriors, the Dragons were pinged for a contentious escort penalty which gifted the home side two points late in the game. <\/p>\n

Another decision which frustrated Cook and interim coach Dean Young was an apparent forward pass which led to a Dallin Watene-Zelezniak try soon after half time which gave the Warriors the lead.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe\u2019re not getting rewarded for the effort we\u2019re putting in,\u201d a frustrated Cook said. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe Warriors got a lot of stuff out there, we\u2019re putting a lot of effort, we\u2019re fighting for play the balls, we\u2019re not getting the same six agains. <\/p>\n

\u201cWe come out of half time, they throw a forward pass, we\u2019re chasing points straight away when we\u2019re in control of that game. It\u2019s just not right.\u201d<\/p>\n

\u201dI feel sorry for the fans that have to have to watch that, but it\u2019s happening too many times to us. <\/p>\n

\u201cI don\u2019t know if it\u2019s because we\u2019re sitting down the bottom, it\u2019s an easy one to throw off because you know the Warriors should win today. I think it\u2019s unfair, and we deserve better moving forward.<\/p>\n

\u201dIt\u2019s a tough place to come to, but I\u2019m proud of the boys in how we fought through the whole game and got on with it.\u201d<\/p>\n

“BAD CALL!” Horror ruling costs Dragons | 00:41<\/p>\n

There was also a strange passage of play when winger Setu Tu scored after being allowed to play on despite being tackled. It meant play stopped to refer to the Bunker which ruled a no try instead of the Dragons being able to play on when they had a clear numbers advantage. <\/p>\n

\u201dThe ref said he wasn\u2019t held, so he gets up and scores a try but then the Bunker goes against the ref, but if he called held, we probably score on the next play because there\u2019s no warriors ready to defend us,\u201d interim coach Dean Young said.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt was a big turning point in the game and it hurt.\u201d<\/p>\n

Young, who did credit the opposition for their performance, also took issue with the flow of the game.<\/p>\n

The club legend says the amount of stoppages played against his side.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019m not taking away anything from the Warriors. The Warriors are a good well-coached team, and they played really well tonight. We\u2019re just frustrated,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a lot um stoppages in play as well tonight. When some of the Warriors players were injured, they stopped the game. <\/p>\n

\u201cThe Warriors players get back up in the defensive line, they\u2019ve reset their D line and they\u2019re in a better position to defend us, so that was frustrating as well. <\/p>\n

\u201cI think there was two or three of those. I\u2019m not saying we just shouldn\u2019t show care towards the players, but let the play go on with the Warriors man out of play, and then if he\u2019s still on the ground after 30 seconds and it\u2019s something serious, stop the game, and then let\u2019s go help the player then.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dragons skipper Damien Cook has unloaded on the officiating in a passionate press conference following his side\u2019s 20-12…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":808804,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[568],"tags":[64,63,761,762,158,85],"class_list":["post-808803","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-nrl","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-national-rugby-league","tag-nationalrugbyleague","tag-nrl","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/808803","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=808803"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/808803\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/808804"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=808803"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=808803"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=808803"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}