People seem to forget the fact that although the player was stood behind the line, his arms were stretched out in front of him. The ball was not touched as far back as his feet were.



Saying that... I still thought it was a knock on!

Just not as much of a knock on as people are saying.

Wasn't Ryan Hall out of play by the touchline and not in goal? If so I didn't think the new rule can be applicable.

Spot on.



With all the video replays and technology these days we seem to think there's a definitive answer on every incident. Sometime though you still have to just give the benefit of the doubt.

If I'm thinking of the same incident, the ball touched the corner flag. The rule re a corner flag being out of play only applies when a ball carrier touches it, not just a ball.

When is a knock on a flick pass and when is it not?

Knock on all day long. Anything other than clearly facing your own posts and you run the risk of it being given,thats the way i've always read it,facing forwards and touching the ball in flight without any control and it's a stone wall knock on. Didn't affect the result in the end at all and i've no axe to grind either way. I do think the video refs interpret things differently depending on which clubs are playing,for some they seem to look for a way to award the try and others a way not to give it. If that'd been Wakey away at saints to win the game with the same officials does anyone genuinely beleive it would have been given? i don't.

Another thing I have noticed more and more is the officials giving a knock on when a player drops the ball from a high kick, after he has turned to face his own line. Its seems to be a reaction to this defensive practice that if the defender doesnt catch it cleanly or if the ball doesnt go clearly AND SIGNIFICANTLY backwards it "must have gone forward"..(irrespective of the laws of physics)

I think you've asked that the wrong way round.



"When I'd a flick pass a knock on? And when is it not?"



When a flick pass (or any pass) hits the ground, it is a knock on if it's forward.

If it finds a player first, it's a pass.



You can't check for a forward pass, but you can check for a knock on.

It looked like a knock-on to me, but the video replay wasn't conclusive. The attacking side usually get the benefit of the doubt, so I don't have any real problem with the final decision.

That nonsense really isnt it, a pass doesnt stop being a pass because the player it was passed to failed to catch it.



What is it in the time between the ball being passed and and it being caught/allowed to bounce? Is it in some weird state of being both passed and not passed and being both a knock on and not a knock on?

It's in the corridor of uncertainty; a known unknown.

Quantum rugby?