NSW coach Brad Fittler admits seeking the referees boss over a boot-throwing incident that went overlooked in game one of State of Origin.
Fittler claimed Blues skipper Boyd Cordner played six second-half minutes without a boot after Ben Hunt ripped it off his foot and threw it over the sideline.
At one stage, Cordner even kicked the ball with his bootless left foot after finding himself with the ball on the fifth tackle.
The incident prompted an annoyed Fittler to broach the topic with the game's officials, who initially giggled in response.
"I spoke to the referees boss and he giggled and I said, 'Well I'm going to now coach my players to do it'," Fittler said on The Sunday Footy Show.
"And all of a sudden he went, 'You know what, we need to do something about this. There needs to be something written in'.
"You just can't have people slipping around on the field and you can't have people throwing boots off into the crowd. Simple as that."
Fittler also again defended his interchange rotation, despite continued criticism over his decision to substitute five-eighth Cody Walker in the second half.
Key prop David Klemmer played 52 minutes straight and failed to return
Fittler instead said the Blues' biggest issues were their errors and edge defence.
"The fact was we made three errors in a short period of time," he said.
"One was on a first-tackle, one was on a second, and we gave a penalty away on a fifth tackle.
"So that workload itself is nearly unbearable.
"The biggest problem we had was our edge defence panicked a little bit. That's the thing we've got to look at most.
"Cody Walker come back on at the end and we nearly won the game.
"We were a pass away from winning the game.
"I was more than happy with the interchange."
NSW will be forced to make at least one change with Klemmer ruled out for up to six weeks with a wrist injury.
Tom Trbojevic is likely to come into calculations after successfully making his return from a hamstring injury for Manly on Saturday night.
Fittler described Trbojevic's performance as "mixed" and was bullish about his chances for game two in Perth.
"(He) did some really good things with the ball," Fittler said.
"One at first receiver, then he set up a try later for (Jorge) Taufua when he went to the line and hit his winger with the pass, which is something he does quite often.
"There was a lot of errors in and amongst that, there was a couple of cold drops, which shows he was a little hesitant coming towards the ball.
"He's got another week. He looked hesitant and that's his second hamstring injury.
"It's one of those injuries that's very mental."
