Kiwi former NRL referee Henry Perenara believes One NZ chief executive Jason Paris crossed a line with his recent comments about alleged bias among referees against NZ Warriors.
Paris' social media outburst after the Warriors' hard-fought loss to Penrith Panthers included accusations of "cheating of the highest order", prompting the NRL to launch an investigation into the incident. One NZ is the primary sponsor of the NZ-based club.
Perenara, 42, is uniquely qualified to pass judgment on the matter, having been on both sides of the fence. He spent seven years as a player in the NRL for five different clubs, making his debut with the Warriors in a short three-game stint in 2000.
After calling time on his playing career, he transitioned into refereeing, overseeing 135 games at NRL and test level, before hanging up his whistle in 2021.
While Perenara concedes fans and players are completely within their rights to query certain decisions referees make, taking aim at a referee's honesty as a professional is a step too far.
"You can question decisions, there's no doubt about that," Perenara told AM.
"That's the reason why rugby league is so great - everybody has an opinion, and is so passionate about the sport and so passionate about their teams.
"But the line is drawn in the sand when you start to question the integrity of a referee. You're going into really murky waters… it's not warranted at all.
"That's when I believe there's a problem."
In the wake of the frenzy caused by his comments, Paris withdrew his initial claim that referees were "cheating" but maintained there's an "unconscious bias" against the Warriors consistently resulting in key decisions going against them, of which there were a trio of examples in Saturday's 18-6 defeat to the Panthers.
In the wake of the frenzy caused by his comments, Paris withdrew his initial claim that referees were "cheating", but maintained there's an "unconscious bias" against the Warriors.
In his weekly review on Tuesday, referees boss Graeme Annesley addressed Paris' comments, describing them as an "attack on the administration of the game."
Annesley rejected any suggestion that the Warriors have been victims of any supposed unfair treatment by referees, and Perenara agrees.
"Referees aren't going to be perfect and people in the bunker aren't going to be perfect," said Perenara.
"Let me tell you first hand, it is a really, really tricky job because every single decision you make is judged in slo-mo, but the referee sees it in fast speed.
"We obviously know how athletic and how fast they are. The guys that are playing football today, there's no way I would've been able to compete if they were around when I was playing.
"We used to have a saying 'you get judged in slo-mo but you see it in fast speed'."
With a wealth of experience as both a player and an official, Perenara insists the hardest workers he's come across during his time as a rugby league professional were those in the referees room painstakingly trying to improve using feedback from past performance.
"I can tell you for a fact - the referees work harder than any other club I was at, and the reason being is that a lot of it is personal reflection and personal review."
He's also seen the ugly side of that feedback, where family and loved ones get caught in the crossfire.
"It's hard. When you're by yourself, you can take that easy. Personally, you build up this resilience around you.
"Everywhere you go - every decision you make - somebody's not going to like. So you've got referees going out there knowing that every decision they make, they're going to cop a hammering for it
"The hardest part is when you start to affect the family. You can build up resilience, but if you have children, they're none the wiser.
"Once they start getting older and obviously social media plays a part in it - that's when it really starts to affect you."
