3
Fair point Shasta, however I personally believe that there is enough there for a referee to end up awarding a scrum for accidental offside for what happened.
Facts are:
It is a kick off so players will be in front of others due to not knowing where the ball will be kicked
Ignoring the fact that Read gained advantage from being offside at the kick off, while trying to contest for the ball Read makes contact in the air with the Lions player (Ruled to be fair by TMO)
Ball appears to go slightly forward (would love a slow mo view of that) and directly hits the lions player who only momentarily catches it as a reflex hence no intent of using his position unfairly. Had he not caught the ball the ball would have bounced off him in the direction of his try line.
So for me, the decision to call this an accidental offside is absolutely correct to start with. The refefee's mistake was to blow his whistle for a penalty too hastily.
Now had he allowed play on and whoever it was from the AB that picked the ball and potentially score between the sticks as suggested, ref or TMO would have potentially had a look at offside at the kick off.