Damien

And those last 3 words are why it will never be taken seriously and given the respect it deserves by Australian fans.

Well yes but that's always the nature of these things when action isn't taken at the time. Retrospective action never benefits the victim.

I think Knowles has the bigger issue and absolutely deserves a ban. If Welsby and Knowles both get no bans then the RFL will absolutely come in for criticism and accusations of preferential treatment in Grand Final week.

I think on this forum we have had very few genuinely new posters over the last couple of years. 95% seem to be people returning under a new guise. It's always very easy to tell

That is exactly what I think will happen too. Everyone wins in that scenario.

Yes that's why I said it's no excuse, Currie still got punished albeit it no ban. Falling can be taken into account as mitigation, and so may get someone a lesser punishment, but someone falling in itself doesn't just get someone off scot free. All incidents are different and I don't know what the Currie one was. However it does sound fundamentally different to what Welsby did.

As I said I understand exactly where you are coming from. I admit my first reaction was what a hit and that it was a fantastic tackle. Then I saw it again and it looked worse and worse on each viewing. Now I have no doubt it was foul play. I also have no doubt it was accidental. I even have no doubt Atkin was falling. However people have been banned all season for contact like this and accidental or falling/crouching has been no excuse. If we are to be consistent then it should be punished in line with what we have seen this season.

Yes I know I misread, hence immediately deleting my post.

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Falling or crouching hasn't been an excuse all season.

I understand what you are saying but Atkin could have easily ended by with a broken nose, jaw or cheekbone. Is it only because he didn't that people view it more lightly? With the dangers of concussion in the spotlight it is not just became of the obvious injuries that mean the game needs to take firm action on foul play. Accidental or not it is still foul play and should be punished accordingly in my opinion. Plenty of players accidentally get tackles wrong. I have no doubt that Bateman didn't mean to do what he did either but he should still get banned.

I don't think Atkin knew where he was when he got to his feet. He did Welsby a huge favour but I think if he was thinking straight he would have stayed down.

The tackler has a duty of care and can't be reckless. Flying out of the line at speed and catching someone flush in the face with your shoulder is undoubtedly reckless. I have no doubt it is not what Welsby meant to do but the fact is that is what happened.

It was a question about the LLS shield. The team that finished top received no LLS, they got nothing. Im not sure why you are talking about routes to the Grand Final, that is quite obviously nothing to do with the thread.

Not in London they are not. Hughes has spent over £20 million for the end result of a part time team and a club barely holding its head above water in the Championship. Still with no permanent ground or assets of note either. You also forget that the operational costs of a NRL club get covered and then some by the TV deal. That will not be the case for any English club an NRL club sets up.

Wigan fans knew that a long time ago and have made peace with that. Leeds fans are still in that persecution complex stage.

No we get these debates every single year regardless of team. Leeds fans have really taken the everyone hates us mentality to a whole new level this year.

No worries. If anything the Premiership Trophy suffered in the spell you talked about as Wigan were at Wembley every year and the Premiership final at Old Trafford was only weeks after that. Many fans didn't do both.

Why would they? Brisbane made big promises with talk about rivalling football and 40k crowds but ultimately just proved how little they understood sport in the UK and RL's place in it. NRL clubs may be well off fiancially in rugby terms but it's small change when it comes to cracking the UK market.

In SL it didn't start until 2003, for the first 5 years after the introduction of the Grand Final the team that finished top got nothing. This was a conscious decision to undermine finishing top and to push the Grand Final as the means of determining league champion.

The Champions League is a similar structure to what we see in the NFL. Groups and knockout. Anyhow if you want to selectively choose finals to suit your argument that's fine, its irrelevant really. I think you are comparing apples and pears. SL is not the NFL with blanket media coverage, I don't think I have ever seen any of these things you say SL crams into its build up week on mainstream media. The All Stars wouldn't play anyone even with a 2 week build up. I personally can't see what difference another week would make, and as I said I'd prefer an extra international game and not eat into that window, but I'm happy to leave it there as its all just opinion. I can see where you are coming from but just disagree.

I think people also forget what great preparation the 1 v 2 game was. It really battle hardened those two teams and left even the loser in great shape to then beat whoever they had too in their 2nd chance semi final.

The Champions League final is watched by more people than the Super Bowl. Even the FA Cup is. I'm also fairly certain that a 2 week build up isn't the reason why the Super Bowl is popular. I'm also even more certain than a 2 week build up will make little difference to the popularity of the SL final.

To satisfy my own curiosity I just looked at the years when we had the top 5 McIntyre system, every final was between the top two. Even when we had the similar top 6 system, where the top two still got a 2nd chance, almost every final was between the top two. In all in 12 years under these two systems we only had 1 team win outside the top two, Bradford from 3rd in 2005. Only twice did we have a team outside the top two in the final, which in both years was the third place team. That suggests to me that these systems rewarded league placing more fairly than ones that lean towards a straight knockout.

Without doubt some decisions went against Salford. However as a fan its often easy to focus on the decisions that go against you. I was rooting for a Salford win but as a neutral Saints were the better team, they blew Salford away in that first half and Salford did great to hang in there. Sometimes you just have to acknowledge the other team were better.