Luke Phillips (born 4 August 1975) is an Australian professional

rugby league Rugby league football, commonly known as rugby league in English-speaking countries and rugby 13/XIII in non-Anglophone Europe, is a contact sport, full-contact sport played by two teams of thirteen players on a rectangular Rugby league playin ...

football match official and former player. He started refereeing

National Rugby League The National Rugby League (also known as the NRL Telstra Premiership for sponsorship reasons) is a professional rugby league competition in Oceania which contains clubs from New South Wales, Queensland, Victoria (state), Victoria, the Austral ...

Premiership matches in 2010, having played seven seasons in the 1990s and 2000s as a goal-kicking for the

Sydney Roosters Eastern Suburbs District Rugby League Football Club, known as the Sydney Roosters are an Australian professional rugby league football club based in Sydney's Eastern Suburbs (Sydney), Eastern Suburbs. The club competes in the National Rugby Lea ...

(with whom he won the

2002 NRL Premiership The 2002 NRL season was the 95th season of professional rugby league football in Australia and the fifth to be run by the National Rugby League. The season was affected by the competition-leading Canterbury-Bankstown Bulldogs' salary cap breach f ...

Canberra Raiders The Canberra Raiders are an Australian professional rugby league football club based in the national capital city of Canberra, Australian Capital Territory. They have competed in Australasia's elite rugby league competition, the National Rugb ...

Manly Warringah Sea Eagles The Manly Warringah Sea Eagles are an Australian professional rugby league club based in Sydney's Northern Beaches. They compete in the National Rugby League (NRL). The Manly club debuted in the 1947 New South Wales Rugby Football League seaso ...

and

North Queensland Cowboys The North Queensland Cowboys is an Australian professional rugby league football club based in Townsville, the largest city in North Queensland. They compete in Australia's premier rugby league competition, the National Rugby League (NRL). Sinc ...

Playing career

After playing for West

Belconnen Belconnen () is a Lands administrative divisions of Australia#Australian Capital Territory, district in the Australian Capital Territory in Australia. The district is subdivided into 27 divisions (suburbs), sections and blocks. As at the , the ...

Warriors as a junior, Phillips made his first-grade debut for the

in the

1996 ARL season The 1996 ARL premiership (also known as the 1996 Optus Cup due to sponsorship from Optus) was the 89th season of professional rugby league football in Australia, and the second to be administered by the Australian Rugby League (ARL). Twenty te ...

against the

Western Reds The Western Reds were a rugby league football club based in Perth, Western Australia. Founded in 1992 as the Western Reds, they entered into the Australian Rugby League competition in 1995 before defecting to the rival Super League (Australia), ...

at the WACA Ground. He played for the

during the 1997 Super League season. He spent his third year in the top grade at a third club after moving to the

Manly Sea Eagles The Manly Warringah Sea Eagles are an Australian professional rugby league club based in Sydney's Northern Beaches. They compete in the National Rugby League (NRL). The Manly club debuted in the 1947 New South Wales Rugby Football League seaso ...

for in

1998 1998 was designated as the ''International Year of the Ocean''. Events January * January 6 – The ''Lunar Prospector'' spacecraft is launched into orbit around the Moon, and later finds evidence for Lunar water, frozen water, in soil i ...

. The following year he moved to the

where he would remain for the rest of his career. His performance for the club at fullback in their 2000 NRL Grand Final loss to the

Brisbane Broncos The Brisbane Broncos are an Australian professional rugby league football club based in Red Hill, a suburb of Brisbane, Queensland. Founded in April 1987, the Broncos compete in the National Rugby League (NRL) and play their home games at ...

drew glowing praise. The Roosters made the

2002 NRL Grand Final The 2002 NRL Grand Final was the conclusive and premiership-deciding game of the 2002 NRL season. It took place on Sunday, 6 October 2002, at Sydney's Telstra Stadium. 80,130 people saw the Sydney Roosters beat the New Zealand Warriors 30–8. ...

and Phillips played at fullback in the winning side with a shoulder injury that was later operated on in the off-season. Phillips' form at the back saw Roosters coach

Ricky Stuart Ricky John "Sticky" Stuart (born 7 January 1967) is an Australian professional rugby league football coach who is the head coach of Canberra in the National Rugby League (NRL) and a former rugby league footballer who played as a in the 1980 ...

keep

Brett Mullins Brett Mullins (born 21 January 1972) is an Australian former professional rugby league footballer who played in the 1990s, and early 2000s. A New South Wales State of Origin and Australian international representative back, he played his club ...

on the wing (Mullins is a former teammate of both Stuart and Phillips at the Raiders in 1996 and was also the first choice fullback for the

Australian Australian(s) may refer to: Australia * Australia, a country * Australians, citizens of the Commonwealth of Australia ** European Australians ** Anglo-Celtic Australians, Australians descended principally from British colonists ** Aboriginal Aus ...

test team (alongside Stuart who was the test ) on the

1994 Kangaroo tour The 1994 Kangaroo Tour was the 18th and last Kangaroo Tour played in the conventional format, where the Australia national rugby league team (known as the XXXX Kangaroos due to sponsorship reasons) played a number of matches against British and ...

). However he retired during the first half of the

2003 NRL season The 2003 NRL premiership was the 96th season of professional rugby league football in Australia and the sixth run by the National Rugby League. Fifteen teams competed, with the Manly-Warringah Sea Eagles returning in place of their failed joint ...

after failing to recover.

Refereeing career

At a Sydney Roosters function sometime after his retirement, Luke Phillips was still trying to decide what to in life after football. It was there that former Grand Final and State of Origin winning coach Phil Gould said to him "Why don't you have a go at refereeing? The NRL is looking for players who want to pick up a whistle". Phillips, looking for a way to stay involved in the game, decided to give it a go, though he initially believed he wouldn't enjoy it. After starting out in the Central Coast Division in 2007, Phillips was given a cadetship with the NRL in 2008 (alongside other former first grade players

Henry Perenara Henry Edward Perenara (born 16 June 1980) is a New Zealand rugby league former referee and professional footballer who represented New Zealand. He played as a , though he could also play in the . He is also the first NRL referee in history to s ...

and

Paul Mellor Paul Mellor (born 21 August 1974 in Sydney, New South Wales) is an Australian former professional rugby league footballer who played in the 1990s and 2000s. He played for four different Sydney NRL clubs and in Britain before retiring at the en ...

). He then started officiating in the Under-20s National Youth Competition (NYC) in

2009 2009 was designated as the International Year of Astronomy by the United Nations to coincide with the 400th anniversary of Galileo Galilei's first known astronomical studies with a telescope and the publication of Astronomia Nova by Joha ...

. His first appearance in the NRL was as a touch judge in Round 26 of the

2009 NRL season The 2009 NRL season was the 102nd season of professional rugby league football club competition in Australia, and the twelfth run by the National Rugby League. For the third consecutive year, sixteen teams competed for the 2009 Telstra Premiersh ...

NRL

After spending most of 2010 refereeing in the

NSW Cup The NSW Cup, currently known as the Knock-On Effect NSW Cup for sponsorship reasons, is a rugby league competition for clubs in New South Wales. The competition has a history dating back to the NSWRFL's origins in 1908, starting off as a reserve ...

(reserve grade), Luke Phillips made his first grade debut as a referee on 21 August for a Round 24 match of the

2010 NRL season The 2010 NRL season was the 103rd season of professional rugby league football club competition in Australia, and the thirteenth run by the National Rugby League (NRL). The season commenced on 12 March and ended with the grand final, played on 3 ...

AAMI Park The Melbourne Rectangular Stadium, currently known as AAMI Park for sponsorship reasons, is a multi-purpose stadium located in the Melbourne Sports and Entertainment Precinct in the suburb of East Melbourne, Melbourne, Victoria (state), Victor ...

Melbourne Melbourne ( , ; Boonwurrung language, Boonwurrung/ or ) is the List of Australian capital cities, capital and List of cities in Australia by population, most populous city of the States and territories of Australia, Australian state of Victori ...

as the

Melbourne Storm The Melbourne Storm is a rugby league football club based in Melbourne, Victoria (Australia), Victoria, Australia that participates in the National Rugby League (NRL). The club plays its home games at AAMI Park, and wears a purple and navy blu ...

defeated

Cronulla Cronulla is a suburb of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. Boasting numerous surf beaches and swimming spots, the suburb attracts both tourists and Greater Sydney residents. Cronulla is 26 kilometres south of the Sydney central ...

24–4. He then made a further three appearances in the

2011 NRL season The 2011 NRL season was the 104th season of professional rugby league football club competition in Australia, and the fourteenth and last run by the National Rugby League's partnership committee of the Australian Rugby League and News Ltd. The ...

while mostly officiating in the 2011 NSW Cup. He spent all of

2012 2012 was designated as: *International Year of Cooperatives *International Year of Sustainable Energy for All Events January *January 4 – The Cicada 3301 internet hunt begins. * January 12 – Peaceful protests begin in the R ...

refereeing in the NSW Cup, though he has since become a regular first grade referee in the

2013 NRL season The 2013 NRL season was the 106th season of professional rugby league club competition in Australia. The National Rugby League's main competition, named the 2013 Telstra Premiership after major sponsors Telstra Corporation, was contested by sixt ...

. Although he was yet to make his NRL debut as a referee at the time, Phillips was selected alongside

Ashley Klein Ashley Klein is an Australian rugby league referee. He first refereed in England, beginning his career in the Rugby League Conference, but returned to Australia and referees in the National Rugby League. Klein refereed the NRL grand finals in ...

Shayne Hayne Kevin John "Shayne" Hayne (born 31 October 1967 in Wellington, New South Wales,) is an Australian former rugby league referee. He officiated in the National Rugby League, City vs Country Origin, State of Origin series, All Stars Matches, the ...

and Gavin Badger to referee the inaugural NRL All Stars game at

Skilled Park Robina Stadium, commercially known as Cbus Super Stadium, is a multi-purpose rectangular stadium in Robina, a suburb of Gold Coast, Queensland. It is the home ground to the National Rugby League's Gold Coast Titans, this venue sometimes host ...

on the Gold Coast in

2010 The year saw a multitude of natural and environmental disasters such as the 2010 Haiti earthquake, the Deepwater Horizon oil spill, and the 2010 Chile earthquake. The 2009 swine flu pandemic, swine flu pandemic which began the previous year ...

. Phillips juggles his time as a full-time NRL referee with running his own

Pinball Pinball games are a family of games in which a ball is propelled into a specially designed table where it bounces off various obstacles, scoring points either en route or when it comes to rest. Historically the board was studded with nails call ...

and

Video game A video game or computer game is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface or input device (such as a joystick, game controller, controller, computer keyboard, keyboard, or motion sensing device) to generate visual fe ...

supply business.Ex-Grand Final Hero now a Referee
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References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Phillips, Luke 1975 births Living people Australian rugby league players Australian rugby league referees Canberra Raiders players Manly Warringah Sea Eagles players National Rugby League referees North Queensland Cowboys players Rugby league fullbacks Rugby league players from Canberra Sydney Roosters players