NRL to take action against pitch invaders

The NRL spectators who rushed the field during round five could find themselves banned from attending future games, with the league also confirming it would support police if they chose to launch legal action.

In the first of the weekend's two pitch invasions, a woman ran onto the field during Saturday night's clash between the Eels and Titans.

She was subsequently tackled by a security guard and escorted from the field.

On Sunday afternoon, four protesters rushed onto the field during the Sharks' defeat of the Tigers. One of the group let a flare loose and approached a group of players.

At his weekly press briefing on Monday, the NRL's head of football elite competitions, Graham Annesley, said the league would take action once it could identify the pitch invaders.

The female pitch invader, Javon Johnson, has already outed herself and spoken about her antics on radio.

"Clearly what happened was not something that we would like to see happen again," said Annesley.

"If we can identify offenders and clearly in a couple of cases we can, we will ban them from NRL games. We have the ability to do that.

"In the meantime, we've asked both (home teams) for a report from their security contractors to determine what exactly happened, but more importantly, how they propose to address this going forward."

Annesley said the NRL would support the police if they chose to take further action against the pitch invaders.

"We would support the police in any prosecution that they launch against people who are breaking the law," he said.

"They are breaking the law by invading the pitch like that. We would clearly be supportive of any prosecutions that the police might launch."

Annesley said the NRL needed to re-examine its security protocols for the sake of the players.

"We have to learn from these things and we have to always look at how we can tighten our security arrangements. We'll do that in conjunction with the clubs," he said.

"Our first and primary concern is the safety of the players.

"To have a flare on the field … that's not a good situation for our game and it's not one that we want to see continue.

"We'll do whatever we can by working with our clubs and working with the police to try and make sure people don't take opportunities to try and make a statement, or just even interrupt the game.

"There are other ways they can make their feelings known without breaking the law."