AB Knight

Wouldn’t be fair to discuss York players salaries but I believe they get a lump sum at the start of the season then bonuses for win/draw/loss - there’s a book about Batley Bulldogs written 3 years ago and it’s said players got around £5k lump sum then I think around £200-300 a win. So you could be looking at £8k-£10k for most players. Thats a significant cost. Don’t want to worry people but I hope clubs going bankrupt is the biggest of our worries in the months ahead. I believe countries around the world are hopeful all because China state they don’t have many cases now. I wouldn’t believe a thing China says right now. As soon as a non secretive country (where the state doesn’t control what the population can do, say and read) comes out and says cases are on the decline, that’s when I’ll sleep better.

Obviously we don’t know how things will develop but I think we could scrap the 1895 cup, the loop fixtures in SL and push everything back, even if it means the season ending in November/December. Then next season start later.

One of my colleagues at Royal Mail delivered a parcel to the husband of someone with Coronavirus, she was inside in isolation, and my colleague was instructed to leave the parcel on the doorstep. I thought it was cobblers but it’s been in a few Facebook groups connected to the village he delivered to and in the last few hours it’s been confirmed there’s a new case in North Yorkshire. On a side note our depot delivers to the hotel which had the first recorded case of the virus in the UK.

Thank you very much, can now work on the stats for the York City Knights match programme!

Can anyone help me with the attendances from round 3 of the Championship please? The matches were on Sunday 16th February, League Express will have published them 17th February but I couldn’t get hold of a copy that week. Thanks in advance!

So close....thought we deserved something from that but it’s a big step in the right direction. Good backing from a pretty full main stand (my guess is the crowd was about 1500). Just needed a bit of game management, not sure why in the 2nd half we kept giving the ball to a forward to try and power over the line when our tries were both scored from kick throughs and making them turn. Butterscotch showed up well, Bass did well, Scott ran hard as always, Marsh showed his class. Just missing that composure in the halves - what we’d give for a Cockayne, Murrell, Finn etc. Ref - could’ve pulled London up for slowing down play, but both sides got away with a couple of suspect high tackles and I was directly in line with the kick through for Marsh’s second try, he was marginally in front of the kicker where I was sat which wasn’t picked up by the officials- just shows overall during a match decisions tend to even out. Hopefully a morale boosting win against Rochdale, a competitive showing in front of the cameras against Fev (who were pushed all the way by unfancied Swindon today) then a big match at Oldham which will be a must win game.

Feeling a bit more positive today, could do with a good start, London won’t be bringing more than a handful of fans so let’s make it a good atmosphere and get behind them.

A few pints in the Winchester while it blows over will do me

If selected I’ll give Wallis my full support, but I don’t think this is the right match for him to rebuild his confidence. Rochdale in the cup perhaps? If we went with Bass at full back, Marsh in the halves not sure who else could go on the wing.

I think that is the case. I’ve witnessed racism at just one game since I started watching the sport in 1995, a group of idiots aiming monkey chants at a player (who ironically joined that club a couple of years later). It was reported to the stewards straightaway who came over and almost apologetically told them to quieten down. We either need to police things better and clubs will have to shell out for police presence and/or bouncers. Or we make the punishment so severe (10 year ban from the sport for example) that people won’t risk shouting abuse. Right now we are doing neither, it reminds me of the mobile phone while driving situation - people are still driving around with a phone to their ear, look at when a car is sat waiting at traffic lights and the driver is more often than not looking between their legs, texting. Why do they risk it? Because it’s, what, a couple of hundred quid fine and a handful of points? Plus the chances of being caught are low. Change the punishment so that if caught you instantly lose your licence for 5 years, and/or your car is crushed and only the most idiotic would risk it.

One of the best things I did for myself was to stop attending Cas games regularly (who were challenging for the top 4, finals etc) and head to my local club York City Knights (who at the time were mid level League 1 and about to be made homeless). I went from being a staunch Cas fan thinking every ref hated us, the RFL wanted us out etc etc, to being able to attend York matches as a bit more of a neutral - sure, I still want York to win but I’m able to be a bit more balanced at games now. I’ve been to about 100 York games and there’s only 1 match (vs Barrow in the Challenge Cup in 2017) whereby I think the official had a huge bearing on the result. But I see it in the diehard York fans now. I remember one ‘gob on legs’ York fan arguing with me at Odsal in 2018 because York weren’t awarded a 40/20 - York had kicked from just inside their own half but that fan was adamant it was a 40/20, even though they agreed with where the player had kicked it from. Another had a bee in his bonnet cos York weren’t allowed a quick tap - there were 2 balls on the pitch. Some people you just can’t reach. Last night I watched Warrington vs Castleford, Rob Hicks the referee (original poster - not sure if he is your husband. I thought he handled the game very well). I’ve seen Rob a few times as a spectator at Batley games with I assume his young son which I think is great, and I know he had death threats against him last season. Last night I really wanted Cas to win, no doubt about it, but I thought he handled the game well. It looked a possible forward pass in the build up for the Wire try but on the flip side I thought Cas got away with a lot of holding down, a different ref might’ve sin binned a Tigers player. This morning I’ve read a few Cas Facebook groups, it’s full of people calling him a cheat etc. Just not deserved. Maybe it also helps that I’ve been a touch judge at a handful of amateur matches and it’s tough.

Bass, Porter and Sharp all back. No Carr, Brining our injured, as is Whiteley and propably Ronan Dixon. I expect Bass and Sharp on the wings, Butterworth straight swap on the bench for Brining. Gonna be a close one....the bookies can’t decide between the 2 clubs, you get the same odds no matter which side you pick!

The other winger (Lewis Carr) is in the Cas reserves squad to play down in London on Saturday, will be interesting to see which of the 2 games he plays or if he plays both! Think Whiteley is still out so I’d go with Sharp and Carr (if available) on the wing.

Bit of a Q+A between YorkMix and GLL in this article: https://www.yorkmix.com/york-stadium-update-fresh-delays-but-no-structural-issues/

Hopefully a new player will create a spark. Also re: O’Neill at Cas, from what I remember he’s knocking on the door of the 1st team, with McShane (the usual hooker) sometimes required to fill in in the halves I think he’ll get his chance soon. Anyway enough about the Tiggers, back to York Knights now....

Always amuses me whenever I gig in WMCs, they never put a table aside for the band so you inevitably sit in old Tommy’s seat who’s been in for half a pint of mild every night since 1923. Of course, someone could give you a little nudge and a heads up but that would be too simple, the British thing to do is stare, tut and complain about it later

I wouldn’t be surprised if Cas actually gave us some advice as I believe Reiss was on loan there last season.

I missed that! Still, I hope he forces his way into the squad

No Truman in the squad, no mention of him in the 4 pages of this thread....am I missing something? I thought overall last season he had a good season and has started 2020 in fine form. Agree about Hill, sometimes you just gotta let go...

I doubt we’ll see any new faces for this game, there’s the Gary Wheeler rumour although I’d have been happy with the very experienced Martin Ridyard from Leigh (just joined Rochdale on loan). It got to a point last Sunday where I honestly thought we’d be more effective with Ben Johnston replacing the young lad on the wing and Marsh moving into the halves. But it’s easy to be an internet coach! From watching the cup game London play quick however like us their defence hasn’t been at its best. Expect plenty of points, a Knights win would be a huge relief.

Fully agree with that. Ive moaned about this before but I never think we make it easy for fans. Not just price but making it much more straightforward for floating fans and the ‘might go to the game’ section. Season ticket holders are usually diehard fans who will turn up regardless. I wish clubs would be forward thinking, have ‘contactless’ turnstiles, make it so every club offers the ability to buy a ticket and download it to your phone. While I don’t like Bradford Bulls all that much (recent rivalry!), at the Bulls vs York friendly it took me just 2 minutes that morning to sign up on their easy to navigate website and have tickets downloaded to my phone. It’s a ball ache when you’re trying to find the hidden ticket page on a clubs website, then have to queue up to collect it, then queue to get in. Buses, cinemas, theatres, pubs, you can now pay for all these on your card, book in advance, pick your seat, have food brought to your table without even having to go to the bar. We need to catchup and quickly.

I said at the time instead of good Friday, Easter Monday (when most players will have the day off) followed by Sunday, they now expect part time Fev players to be able to take at least the Wednesday and Thursday off following bank holiday Monday. Don't know about others but most jobs I’ve done, you’re playing catch up after bank holiday Monday, can’t see many employers being open to the working players doing a 2 day week (Tues+Fri). Dreadful planning, surely with Toulouse being (I think) full time they could’ve reversed the fixtures and play this one at Fev?

Likewise I was stood near the front of the terraced end, there was no doubt about Jubb’s attempt, definite no try which the ref got right. I thought Lewis Carr did ok, despite what some think DR is the least of our worries at the moment!

Not sure how much it was on the day today but I bought a standing ticket for £17 during the week. Health/age reasons aside, I’ll never understand why 99% of York fans prefer to sit and would gladly pay (£5???) extra to do so. In fact I’m struggling to think of many clubs who’s fans if given a choice prefer to sit - ignoring all seater grounds, only ones I can think of are possibly Salford, where it seems to be 50/50 between the terrace behind the sticks and the big seating stand. Also Featherstone where most go in the seating stand but then stand up...always been a strange lot have Fev

Testing times for York. Worst performance I’ve seen since 2016 and I’ve been to about 80-90% of games. Our halfbacks (Connor Robinson and Ben Johnston) for me are too similar in how they play, at the moment it’s not working in that department. Wallis on the wing, very poor body language, standing away from teammates when they had a team talk after each conceded try and in the 2nd half arguing with his own team mates. I make it he’s been out of position for 7 tries in 3 games. I hate to bag players, I could never play week in week out like them and I get that he’s a developing winger but this is not a development league. Not putting the white flag up yet but if we go to Oldham in 3 weeks time with P 5 W 0 I won’t be confident of picking up our first win. Something doesn’t seem right, I just hope it’s the off field stadium talk and amount of new players needing to gel. Well played Halifax btw, easy to focus on your own side and say we made the opposition look good. In parts that might be true but Fax were a cut above, Murrel as usual bossed it and they had an answer to everything.