NRL head of football Graham Annesley concedes the bunker got it wrong when Canberra's Bailey Simonsson was sin-binned in Saturday's 20-14 loss to Melbourne.
On Sunday Annesley was forced to admit the bunker's blunder after Simonsson was sent to the bin for a professional foul when he collided with Josh Addo-Carr in contest for the ball.
"In my opinion we got this one wrong," Annesley said.
"Both players were scrambling for the ball and in that situation there was always going to be some sort of contact, but I don't believe there was any intent to take Josh Addo-Carr out."
It comes a week after another controversial bunker decision robbed Manly of a penalty on fulltime in their loss to Newcastle for a similar incident.
"The bunker is over-analysing these incidents from a technical point of view, instead of just looking at incidents from a fan's perspective to decide what most people would consider a fair and reasonable decision," Annesley said.
Annesley's admission will be of little comfort to the Raiders who conceded a try to Storm while Simonsson was off the field, and eventually lost by the margin of a converted try.
"We should never have been a man down, there is no way in the world he should have been sent to the sin-bin," Raiders coach Ricky Stuart said.
"I don't want to make a big issue of it, but I don't understand how we use all this technology and money and we still get it wrong.
"They got it wrong, it's as simple as that. Like they did in the Manly game (last week). But they will be back in the box next week."
Australian Associated Press
