Dave T

You can hear the linesman say he thought it was late, and Alibert said he thought it was fine - as it was a crucial stage, he rightly asked the VR to have a check. The VR then made the decision that Donald had tackled Richards late. I agree with you that it was a harsh call, and the slow-mo replays don't help with these calls. Whether we agree with it or not, the call was that Donald's tackle was late, and based on that decision, the penalty was in exactly the right position (right down to Alibert making Richards move a metre back at the last second).

Your original post made me think more about this. If they watched it and decided that McGuire's challenge was a professional foul, but then agreed to in effect play on as Wigan were still on the attack and gained a further advantage then wouldn't that negate the foul from McGuire ie. he wouldn't be able to be binned? I suppose it is like if somebody pulls somebody back but the team then goes on to score, the offender does not then get binned too. I wonder whether it was a case of one or the other, ie. you can't give advantage and the penalty in the Leeds half and sinbin McGuire. If you were going to bin McGuire, I wonder whether the penalty would have to have been given in Wigan's own half. It would be very interesting to get Cummings official stance on this one.

No penalty was given for McGuire's challenge, although this may simply have been due to the fact that the VR decided to allow advantage and decided there was a 2nd offence in a more beneficial spot to Wigan.

When SL first started and we moved to summer there was an opinion that big forwards were a thing of the past, and centres and 2nd rowers were pretty much the same thing. Nowadays I think there has been a shift back to bigger forwards knocking around and bigger packs are becomin more common. At my team, Warrington, there is no way that you would have Westwood or Louis Anderson playng in the centres. They are out and out back-rowers these days, and too big for centre. That isn't to say that there aren't certain utility players who can cover both slots, we have Grix for one, and I'm sure the likes of King or Atkins could do a job in the 2nd row, but at Test level, this surely isn't where we want to go. RP mentioned Atkins, and I agree that he is now looking more and more likely to get a chance. I have previously said I thought it was a year or two too early for him, as he still has some dvelopment work on his defence, but tbh as our options thin out, and the fact that he has had a good 2nd half to the season, I wonder whether he does deserve a run. There is also the safer option of Shenton and Yeaman, who both have Test experience.

Excellent post.

Under no circumstances should we consider playing a second rower at centre. Whatever people think of Bridge, he made a decent debut last year, played again against France this year, and would likely have gone, especially if Warrington win on Saturday and he had a couple more games to prove fitness.

Not sure actually. Was a TV game so you could hear what the ref was saying, he warned Westwood (I think) that he is risking being offside and as 2nd marker he needs to be closer. I don't think we got penalised for it though.

And that is where the problem lies, there is no standard distance quoted. If it was stated that these two players must be within 5m of the ptb then that would make sense, as it is, the word 'immediately' is used and this could be 1m or 5m.

I too am baffled by the anger over this incident. I have even seen somebody mention that he should have got a RED card for it!!!! This was a professional foul, just like we see quite regularly in games. Okay, it came at a crucial time of the match and I can understand people being peeved by it, but some of the responses from some people are hysterical. I'm not sure anybody has ever been referred for holding back!

If there has been an effective tackle and a controlled ptb, there really shouldn't just be a gap as standard. The defence (IMHO) should be able to fill that gap. It is up to the attack to win the collision and then make the gap by beating the markers, or creating their own gaps elsewhere in the defensive line. RL often gets criticism for being too attacking-focused so not sure I agree with this criticism about favouring the defence.

Not sure on the rule exactly (too late in the day to be searching the RFL site) but it is an offence to be too far from the player playing the ball. I know it is something that Warrington have been warned about in the past, although refs will generally have a word rather than penalising this.

TBH I don't have an issue with this. I don't see why the markers should have to be so close to the ptb. If you make them stand right in the face of the bloke playing the ball then it will just make the ptb more untidy IMHO, and isn't helpful to the marker as he will have the attacker right up into him. Also, anything that negates the scoot from acting half is good for me. Scooting should be on the back of a good quick ptb, and not as standard by compressing the markers to leave a gap.

No it's not.

They are very different things that you are talking about. Taking your time to restart the game is one thing, and the ref generally stops the clock so that there is no disadvantage. Stopping the other team taking a quick tap is a professional foul and a yellow card offence. I actually thought there should have been a Hudds yellow card for a professional foul too (holding down after a break), but the James one was very very clear cut.

Have there really been no binnings for this offence this year? Also, it is not a penalty. Play has stopped and therefore a penalty cannot be awarded. It was a professional foul, was stupid, and a clear yellow card. The bad decision that I remember was when he gavea knock on against Crusaders when it was actually one of the cleanest ptb's of the game!

The Wire v Saints crowd was Saints third highest crowd this year - in a game played in poor conditions where everybody must pay, that was bloody good. Hull attracted their 2nd highest crowd of the year, again, all pay. Every single year we hear that the standard has been poor. Why do people bother? I've enjoyed it anyway.

Graham is good at what he does, but I still don't class him as the best prop in Sl and never have (I'm sure he'll be gutted!). My issue with his style of play is that his actual metres per carry is pretty low, and nowhere near the other top props knocking around. Also, and this was seen the other night, his play the ball speed is often very slow. He often gets up looking as though he has been shot and slows the momentum down considerably. His stats look excellent because he plays most games for a long time. Whereas other clubs use 4 props and share the workload effectively, Saints are actually settling for fewer yards per carry, when actually by spelling him I suspect they could get even more from him. I suppose it depends what you want from your props, but personally I want them to make the hard yards, and have a prop who can up the tempo when he comes onto the field and give the team a burst of momentum. There is no doubt he is a very good tough player, but I'm not sure he is being used to the best of his ability.

Surely a measure of how popular these sports are at certain levels is Sky viewing figures. All sports have their top league and some international games shown by SS. engage Super League coverage more often than not outstrips RU Premiership coverage, often by a considerable amount. How does this then translate that more people want to read about the RU Premiership than engage Super League? That doesn't make much sense to me tbh. We can have no complaints at Test level, as RU tests often have double the viewing figures of a RU test, but tbh if we had half their coverage it would be a hell of an improvement.

I have praised Wigan's marketing efforts on numerous occasions this year, however I have also praised the RFL's too. Compared to most SL clubs Wigan's has been excellent, but I still have not seen them do anything that the RFL have not also done. Limited cheap seats for the Big One 2 - the RFL started that last year with

Sorry Allan, it looks like I am following round you on this board challenging your views, and that isn't the case! I'm interested in the above statement you make. What have Wigan done that was so impressive this year, that the RFL haven't?

I don't necessarily disagree with you on that point, but in such a competitive market, we need to use positive media wherever possible. We can only assume that the 300% increase stat is true, and if it is a stat that has been used in a context that makes it a real positive then fine. I have still seen no evidence, or anything that would make me question the honesty of this statement. I agree that it would be great to see actual detail behind this stat, but just because we can't isn't a reason to doubt the honesty surely?

You can request more info and raise the point without the negativity that was attached to your post. Jeez, we all know that the 300% stat was for the purpose of grabbing positive headlines in the media, not as a full statistical report of the game in Wales. There may be other reports knocking around, or you may be able to get more details from the Welsh RL, who knows, but simply knocking it for the sake of it doesn't really do anything for the game. Okay, there may have been 1 club and now there is 4, even if that was the case, isn't that still positive?

Are you saying that the release is not true? It may give limited details (intentionally) however I have no reason to doubt the 300% stat, and if they are basing the 'fastest growing' element on that stat, then fair enough, no lies there. This isn't an academic report or anything like that, it is a release about the fact that RL in Wales is growing, and they have tried to grab some headlines with statements that are hard hitting. What is the issue here. I could understand if you were just doing further digging and asking exactly how much participation has increased by, as that would be interesting to understand, but tbh your post just comes across as negative, unnecessarily IMHO.

Yep, you are right, but aren't we as a sport guilty of not spinning things positively? Why would you turn this into a negative, what benefit is there to that at all?

double post