Cowboys coach Todd Payten let rip at the NRL for their constant tinkering with the rules, warning league officials they are in danger of sapping all the physicality from the game.

In a weekend where the NRL issued an edict aiming to rub out contact with the head or neck, the Magic Round has been overshadowed by comments from coaches.

Canberra coach Ricky Stuart said he feared the game was giving a “leg up” to rival codes, while Canterbury counterpart Trent Barrett said the sport was descending into Oztag.

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Eight players were sin-binned on Friday with Fox League’s Michael Ennis declaring: “It isn’t the game that I played.”

Payten’s Cowboys fell victim to a sin-binning on Saturday night when Lachlan Burr was marched for ten for a high shot on Roosters skipper James Tedesco with the game in the balance.

The Chooks made the Cowboys pay and it left Payten to issue a stern warning to Peter V’landys and the ARL commission.

“I feel sorry for the players, we’ve tried to speed the game up and now we are penalising players with a faster game, under fatigue they find themselves in vulnerable positions,” Payten said.

“I feel sorry for the referees because they’re the ones under pressure to make those calls.

“I really feel sorry for our supporters across the game – this is probably the biggest weekend in our calendar throughout the season and everyone’s spending hard-earned money to turn up, and we’ve taken away from our game of rugby league in the end.”

Asked what change needed to be made, Payten said: “Go back to the way it was... James [Tedesco] was almost on his knees.

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“It was an accident and it wasn’t a decision by Lachlan to hit him in the face or the head.

“The thing I’ve loved about our game however long I’ve played it is the physicality and we’re going away from that and that’s what worries me.”

Ennis echoed Payten’s comments in the Fox League post-game show and said: “What’s reckless? And what’s an accident?

“Accidents are going to happen. The fact the game is so quick and what Todd said, players in a split second get put in a vulnerable position because the fatigue that is in the game – that they wanted and everyone enjoyed.

“At the same time it’s a collision sport and there’s going to be accidents and players don’t deserve to be sent for ten minutes for an accident.”

Roosters coach Trent Robinson, meanwhile, said he thinks the reaction from the NRL would even out in the next weeks.

Robinson was front and centre of the debate when Parramatta duo Dylan Brown and Marata Niukore weren’t sent to the bin in the Roosters’ loss last week.

The Roosters coach, who labelled the bunker “incompetent”, lost Sitili Tupouniua to the bin and predicted players would soon get the message they can’t make contact with the head or neck.

“Based on the rules they both deserved to go,” Robinson said. “As soon as I saw the replay of Sitili’s I knew he was going to the bin. He needed to get lower on that.

“He knew it and he shouldn’t have gone that high. We all knew the consequences.

“It's been signifcant the crackdown this weekend and I have listened to the commentary and all that. I’m different to everybody throwing their arms up and jumping up and down.

“There’s been an overcompensation, it’s pretty easy to see.

“We need to tackle lower, we can’t loosely have head-high tackles and say you got it wrong and that you didn’t mean it. It’s been a bit over the top but it’s also made a point to say don’t hit him in the head.”