21 Jul: SL: London Broncos v St Helens KO 3pm

[Saint Toppy]

10 hours ago, stevereed100 said:

 

Resting 3 or 4 key players is your right,dropping 9 or 10 is definitely bringing the game into disrepute and should be punished by a hefty fine. 

Would you care to post the rule that Saints broke that warrants a fine ?

[Dunbar]

Well, it seems that the consensus opinion is that there is no problem with Saints sending down a weakened team to London. 

My initial comments were that I felt that the teams battling London should be entitled to feel a little aggrieved at the Saints selection today as just two points separate the bottom 5 clubs and  Saints offered London a chance to pick up two points that they would have been unlikely to get against a full strength St Helens team.

But as I want London to stay up anyway and the opinion of most on here is that it hasn't adversely effected the relegation battle then I will forget all about it.

[JohnM]

16 minutes ago, Saint Toppy said:

Would you care to post the rule that Saints broke that warrants a fine ?

No need. As a completly neutral Wigan fan, I'd fine Saints just for being Saints.

[WakefieldCityLoyal]

Saints haven’t broken any rules so can they please name the same side when we play them a week on Friday.

Up the Trin 

[Click]

I think its worth remembering who kicked London out of the CC in the earlier rounds... Forms against teams dictate that Halifax are recently the better team! I am sure they were thinking that Halifax would be harder due to them beating London earlier this season.

[londonbronco]

Assuming Saints reach the CC Final (Sat 24th August) by beating Fax they need to play Leeds the week before away at Headingley (Thurs 15th August).  Who would expect Saints to put out a similar squad against Leeds to the one that played London in this scenario?

[sweaty craiq]

The SL split is playing out I see, saints/Wigan/Wire now hold the SL power and are rubbing it into Hetherington big time

 

[Saint Toppy]

1 hour ago, WakefieldCityLoyal said:

Saints haven’t broken any rules so can they please name the same side when we play them a week on Friday.

Up the Trin 

Holbrook has already hinted that he will “manage” his squad for the rest of the season. This will likely see players being rested most weeks so they are fit for the important games later in the year.

I doubt we’ll see another team like the one against London again except the week before Wembley against the whinos.

[r1ch1e]

3 hours ago, londonbronco said:

Assuming Saints reach the CC Final (Sat 24th August) by beating Fax they need to play Leeds the week before away at Headingley (Thurs 15th August).  Who would expect Saints to put out a similar squad against Leeds to the one that played London in this scenario?

Thursday not a Sunday, so you'd expect that would make a difference. 

[redjonn]

On 22/07/2019 at 09:24, sweaty craiq said:

The SL split is playing out I see, saints/Wigan/Wire now hold the SL power and are rubbing it into Hetherington big time

 

Chuckle, well I assume its tongue in cheek...

Not sure that Wakefield & Huddersfield are too happy either.... as five seem to be in the relegation battle and hence affected by the London team selection.

Although I'm sure that the big 3 as you seem to suggest would prefer Leeds in SL for revenue viewpoint and media rights sales.

[Exiled Wiganer]

On 22/07/2019 at 09:04, londonbronco said:

Assuming Saints reach the CC Final (Sat 24th August) by beating Fax they need to play Leeds the week before away at Headingley (Thurs 15th August).  Who would expect Saints to put out a similar squad against Leeds to the one that played London in this scenario?

By that stage Holbrook’s mind will be more on bulldogs than rhinos, so I suspect we will see some weird and whacky selections on the way to semi final heartbreak. 

[Exiled Wiganer]

It isn’t that the selection for  this game hasn’t directly adversely affected the league prospects of 4 sides, as it almost certainly has, but rather the level of what iffery required to get too worked up about it. These teams will all be playing someone next week who will have had a week off (in Wigan’s case we get 2 weeks compared with 5 days!), and then 4 teams will play the finalists either the week before or the week after. Lots of teams “benefit” from being knocked out of the cup early, every year. 

[tms]

On 22/07/2019 at 08:29, Saint Toppy said:

Would you care to post the rule that Saints broke that warrants a fine ?

there's nothing written down but the rfl mandarins in their wisdom can decide their actions are against the interests of the game and impose a fine remember 2002

An rfl tribunal have handed st helens 25000 fine after they fielded a  weakened team against bradford in the week ahead of the challenge cup final. The tribunal found that they had engaged in conduct prejudicial to the interests of the game 

and in 1973  before the challenge cup semi final FEV played six reserves against leeds and were fined 3500 that's 42 grand in today's money  so fining clubs is nothing new 

 

 

 

[Saint Toppy]

58 minutes ago, POR said:

there's nothing written down but the rfl mandarins in their wisdom can decide their actions are against the interests of the game and impose a fine remember 2002

An rfl tribunal have handed st helens 25000 fine after they fielded a  weakened team against bradford in the week ahead of the challenge cup final. The tribunal found that they had engaged in conduct prejudicial to the interests of the game 

and in 1973  before the challenge cup semi final FEV played six reserves against leeds and were fined 3500 that's 42 grand in today's money  so fining clubs is nothing new 

 

 

 

At the time of that Bradford game there was a separate rule in place that stated teams had to field their strongest teams. Saints broke that rule, hence the fine. That rule disappeared years ago and was subsequently replaced by the requirement to name your match day squad 48Hrs in advance of a match.

Saints named their squad for the London game in accordance with the rules and the match day squad was accepted by the RFL before the game was played. They can't be fined for fielding 17 players from the approved match day squad, regardless of whether you or anybody else thinks it is against the 'spirit' of the game.