🏉 Tigers Tamed After Controversial Call

Good morning, it's Monday, 25 July. You know something is up when you decide to skip watching the footy for the 1st time this year and find you have 124 unread WhatsApp messages. 120 are about the wild finish in the Tigers-Cowboys game, 3 are blurry lasagne pics from Mum and the other one is about your missing pet turtle. We won't bother you with the pasta or reptile, but we've got you covered about the crazy NRL finish in Townsville.

⏱ 1107 words = 6 minutes

👀 A fury footy fan...

THE MAIN GAME

🏉 Tigers do down but prepare to lawyer up

What looked like the upset of the NRL season turned out to be one of the most controversial/dramatic/eventful/divisive/confusing finishes ever. Look at all those buzz words!

The score: North Queensland Cowboys beat Wests Tigers 27-26 in Townsville. 

Golden points: With 5 seconds left on the clock, the Cowboys, down by a point after 2 late Tigers tries, go for a short kick-off to try and get the ball back.

• The Tigers get the ball, the siren sounds and the game is over. Or is it? The Cowboys players rush the ref and use their Captain's Challenge to see if one of their players, Kyle Feldt, has been bumped and taken out illegally going for the ball.

• The NRL Bunker, essentially a Big Brother-style video referee that has the use of replays and super slo-mo to make decisions, decides Feldt was taken out illegally by a Tigers player and informs the on-field ref to award a penalty to the Cowboys, which they successfully kick to win the game.

• Where it gets murky is whether the play was worthy of a penalty and if the play could have been challenged in the 1st place.

• Commentators and greats of the game Andrew Jones, Billy Slater and Greg Alexander say Feldt was milking the contact to get a penalty. Former Bulldogs and Dragons forward James Graham didn't mince his words. He called the ending a "disgrace".

• The NRL has backed the on-field ref's call to allow a Captain's Challenge, but a call on whether it was right to award the penalty will be reviewed today.

They said it: "It shouldn’t have happened. I’m confident that I speak for every Tigers fan and member, the fact that there was no decision to be challenged and then the decision itself, it is beyond comprehension," - Tigers CEO Justin Pascoe on the result.

What's next: Tigers chairman Lee Hagipantelis says he's been in touch with the big wigs at the NRL and is considering all options of appeal, including if the club has legal grounds to dispute the final decision.

Watch it: Check out the final play here and all the confusion.

QUICK SINGLES

🚴‍♂️ Cycling: Jonas Vingegaard wins the Tour de France in a jumbo-sized race for his team. Vingegaard was sipping champagne this morning as he rode to his 1st Tour de France win in the yellow leader's jersey. Vingegaard also won the king of the mountains jersey, while his Jumbo-Visma teammate (soft 'J' on 'Jumbo') Wout van Aert won the green sprinters jersey and the super-combatif jersey as the most aggressive rider.

🏎 F1: Max Verstappen makes the most of Charles Leclerc's error to win the French GP. Leclerc was out in front and doing it easy, but on lap 18 he misjudged a corner and crashed out. It's the 3rd time this season that Leclerc has retired while leading a race, but Verstappen kept his cool to win his 7th GP of the season and is now 63 points clear in the drivers' championship.

🏉 AFL: Elliot kicks Pies into the top 4 after the siren. Jamie Elliott entered Collingwood folklore yesterday at the MCG with a goal after the siren to beat the Bombers 80-76. The win means the Pies are in 4th spot and have won 9 straight games for the first time since 2012.

🥇Athletics: Kelsey-Lee Barber throws her name into the record books. More accurately, Barber threw a javelin really far (66.91m, to be even more accurate) to win gold at the World Athletics Championships in Oregon. It means she's the first woman to win back-to-back javelin world championship titles, and the second Aussie to do it in any track and field event after legend Cathy Freeman in 1999.

⚽️ Football: South Africa are champions of Africa. South Africa beat Morocco 2-1 in the final of the Women's Africa Cup of Nations yesterday, their 1st win in the 14th edition of the tournament. In Europe, the semis are set for the Women's Euros: England will play Sweden (Wed 5am AEST), while France plays Germany (Thur 5am AEST).

LEFT OF FIELD

🏉 AFL: Just when you think you've seen it all at the footy, a fan brings their cat to a game. And it was a Dogs game! Spectators at Marvel Stadium for the huge Bulldogs-Demons game on Saturday night snapped pics of a fan who brought their cat in a carry case and then took it out for a cuddle. It's hard to get any kind of emotion out of cats at the best of times, but this feline looked particularly unimpressed. We don't know which team the cat was supporting, but surely it wasn't the Dogs.

📽 Highlight reel: GWS Giants star Toby Greene almost hit the roof of Marvel Stadium with this enormous mark against Carlton yesterday.

📸 Photo finish: The Commonwealth Games start this Thursday and our Aussie women's cricket team has landed in Birmingham for the T20 competition.

THE POLLING BOOTH

Friday's result: 31.48% votes chips (packet) as the go-to snack while watching sports. There was a lot of support for chocolate and lollies, but we didn't include them because we're trying to cut out sugar.

WHAT WE'RE WATCHING

• ⚾️ 09:00am - MLB - Mets v Padres - Citi Field, New York - Foxtel, Kayo

• 🥇 10:00am - Athletics - World Championships, Day 10 - University of Oregon, Oregon - Foxtel, Kayo

All times AEST

THE MANAGER'S OFFICE

If you want to avoid being called into the manager's office for an honest conversation (it'd probably be over Zoom to avoid confrontation)... tell your mates about us so we can grow big and strong. Thanks in advance 🙏