NRL chief Andrew Abdo has revealed his desire to ensure players don’t milk penalties after a chaotic week of sin bins in round eight.

The one incident that could’ve sparked significant outrage happened between the Sharks and Tigers when Ronaldo Mulitalo was clipped in the face by the open hand of Jack Bird.

Mulitalo clutched at his face and encouraged a captain’s challenge, which the Sharks going forward with.

READ MORE: Three stunning axings that could rock Origin

READ MORE: NRL boss admits ‘overreaction’ in face of public outrage

READ MORE: Premiership hero dies hours after stirring Blues victory

“Please Ronaldo don’t do this,” Andrew Johns said on Nine.

The challenge was unsuccessful with Paul Gallen saying “that would’ve been the death of the game”.

Speaking on Nine’s 100% Footy, Abdo agreed it’s the type of incident he doesn’t want happening in the game.

“We don’t want to see that. We don’t want to see a situation where we’re set up to fail and encouraging players to milk penalties, that’s the last thing we want,” he said.

“I think some of the decisions the referees have made despite that are phenomenal and they deserve credit for that because it is difficult in those situations.”

Abdo went on to state it’s up to the players and game’s stakeholders to work together and ensure the high shots are policed correctly.

“We certainly don’t want to encourage players milking or looking for slight contact to the head and that’s where I think some of our directives around exactly what level of force is will assist us in going forward,” he said.

100% Footy is now available as a podcast! Subscribe/follow via Apple, Spotify or Google Podcasts  

Abdo’s comments come after he earlier responded to the dramatic weekend of action that saw 18 players sin binned and the likes of Johns up in arms over the officiating.

Despite the league’s hierarchy claiming there has been no crackdown in recent weeks, the events in round eight that saw a host of controversial calls tell a different story.

Johns was highly critical of decisions to sanction Scott Sorensen and Fonua Pole over the weekend, labelling them as “a joke” during the Nine coverage.

In the wake of the chaos and heading into Magic Round, the game’s chief executive spoke to 2GB radio on Monday morning to react to the outrage.

“I completely understand why people are being frustrated,” Abdo said.

“I think it’s important to put things into perspective and just state a few things.

“First of all, there’s been no crackdown or policy change. A couple of weeks ago, there was a round where the refs missed a few high tackles that should have been sin binned and we communicated through the clubs that’s not the standard.

“What we’ve seen now is perhaps a slight overreaction – which is unfortunate – and I get the frustration around the Bunker intervening in play, that is certainly not something any of us want to see and that’s meant to be for serious acts of foul play or the howlers.

“There’s probably been too many of those where that disrupts play and gets pulled back and it’s something we’re going to work on.

Watch the 2025 NRL premiership live and free on Nine and 9Now.

“The other thing I want to say is that we’ve had some terrific football, but we’ve also seen a huge increase in the number of high tackles this season – and with that is going to come an increase in penalties and sin bins.

“We are also calling on the players and clubs to be more disciplined and to always think about player safety as part of how they prepare for the game.”

From the long list of players binned for high contact or illegal play in round eight, the only players who ended up copping suspensions were Sorensen, Jaimin Jolliffe, Latrell Mitchell, Matt Burton, Sitili Tupouniua and Josh Curran.

A large part of the frustration that came from fans and experts alike surrounded the Bunker stopping play in a following set and the referee binning a player after the fact.

Abdo admitted these types of incidents need to be eradicated.

“There has been too much intervention – the Bunker is meant to intervene if there’s been a serious act of foul play or it’s a howler,” he said.

“There have been instances this round and this season where we shouldn’t have stopped play and the bar was too low. There have also been instances where we have missed sin bins, so we are going to keep working on trying to get this right. 

“We don’t want to see the Bunker intervening and stopping play unnecessarily. We want to see less of that and keep that for serious acts of foul play.”

While criticism towards match officials has been coming thick and fast, Abdo claims he is happy with the group and again reiterated there had been “no change” or crackdown.

“The referees do an incredible job and they have our support,” he said.

“It’s a tough job, they are dealing with a game that’s fast and there’s a lot going on.

“There has been no change in policy, I can’t be more clear on this.

“I accept and concede that we need to be better.” 

On 100% Footy, Abdo was once again asked about the high shots, with one particular question around whether he expects players to lower their point of contact when tackling.

The NRL boss admitted it’s a complex area before adding there’s a “duty of care to avoid direct, forceful contact to the head when possible”.

“We’re not going to take a backwards step from player safety and I think we all agree on this and it’s important that the policy around protecting players from direct, high impact, significant force with no mitigation, those are going to continue to be penalised and sin binned,” he said.

“Unfortunately we’ve seen a few incidents where that wasn’t the case and we’re going to rectify that.”