Quote ="Deano G"That might have been the RFL's intention (and actually I agree with your interpretation, this is probably what they meant), but they got the drafting horribly wrong.
Personally I would have preferred them to have said something like in the act of touching the ball down as I think that concept is clearer than referring to a period in which the ball is touched down or just after or just before the ball is touched down, but either would be better than the present wording, which is nonsensical.'"
I think any ambiguous wording is going to be problematic, whether it's "in the period" or "in the act of". Both phrases raise questions around their definition: when does the period begin and end?; when does the act of scoring begin and end? You might be right, however, in that "in the act of" is conceptually clearer, even if some ambiguity remains. Diving, for instance, is arguably an obvious part of the act of try scoring. The only way to eradicate those questions fully, though, would be to have absolute applications of the law, such as "this law applies only when the ball is grounded" which, in this case, would create its own problem of allowing offences just before and after grounding. In cases where ambiguity is required I suppose we just have to accept that there will be a degree of ambiguity and hope the referees have enough guidance to make appropriate decisions.
