: Mon Mar 23, 2009 8:16 pm
Having been on the course and being "qualified" I can say that we were told that, to avoid confusion and/or conflicting opinions, the touch judge should only offer an opinion if asked for it.
Imagine a TJ flagging for a forward pass and the defence hesitating as a result when the referee has already made up his mind that it wasn't forward.
If when a try is "scored" the TJ suspects a reason to disallow it, he/she will then make it known by not standing in the corner of the in goal area.
Other than that all communication between the TJ and the ref is mostly by eye contact and discreet signals and goes mostly unseen by the fanatical supporters.
This system is less than ideal and an alternative method of communicating between the officials and allowing spectators to be aware that this communication is taking place, is long overdue