3 SL Clubs Fined for Covid Breaches

[Griff]

Just now, DimmestStar said:

Which is was .

You're right.   But what matters is not what it is now but what it ends up as and I already edited my reply to reflect that.

[DimmestStar]

1 minute ago, Griff said:

You're right.   But what matters is not what it is now but what it ends up as and I already edited my reply to reflect that.

Hey what matters is that cheats are punished and Cas haven't been. 

[Les Tonks Sidestep]

42 minutes ago, Fevrover said:

Why is so much of the fine suspended? Asking for a friend.

As well as gazza's reply, this probably added to the reasons why a fine handed out a few weeks ago wasn't suspended

The fine reflects the club’s failure to properly comply with the law, Operational Rules and the RFL investigation. The club deliberately withheld information from the investigator, in order to avoid players being stood down. The actions of individual club members led to an unnecessarily protracted, expensive and extremely time-consuming process. 

Points deduction and fine for Featherstone Rovers (rugby-league.com)

[wasginger]

3 hours ago, M j M said:

Good grief, how much of a chip on your shoulder have you got?

As far as I'm aware the clubs fined here didn't engage in a conspiracy to cover up what happened or actually go ahead and play a game when a bunch of players should have been isolating.

No chip on my shoulder I can assure you. So who's negligent in the 3 clubs cases. Is it the clubs for not abiding by the protocols set out or is it the S/L or RFL that's at blame, for knowingly letting these clubs get away with their infringements at the time, or have they just discovered the failure of the clubs to follow covid protocols.

[wasginger]

3 hours ago, M j M said:

Good grief, how much of a chip on your shoulder have you got?

As far as I'm aware the clubs fined here didn't engage in a conspiracy to cover up what happened or actually go ahead and play a game when a bunch of players should have been isolating.

No chip on my shoulder I can assure you. So who's negligent in the 3 clubs cases. Is it the clubs for not abiding by the protocols set out or is it the S/L or RFL that's at blame, for knowingly letting these clubs get away with their infringements at the time, or have they just discovered the failure of the clubs to follow covid protocols.

[Red Willow]

What a surprise Salford fined.

I am no longer surprised by punishments handed out to Salford. I don't expect the same will be applied to other clubs.

Edited August 24, 2021 by Red Willow

[Jim Prendle]

19 minutes ago, wasginger said:

No chip on my shoulder I can assure you. So who's negligent in the 3 clubs cases. Is it the clubs for not abiding by the protocols set out or is it the S/L or RFL that's at blame, for knowingly letting these clubs get away with their infringements at the time, or have they just discovered the failure of the clubs to follow covid protocols.

None of the above, it's obviously Wigan's fault.

[Les Tonks Sidestep]

23 minutes ago, Red Willow said:

What a surprise Salford fined.

I am no longer surprised by punishments handed out to Salford. I don't expect the same will be applied to other clubs.

Did you miss Cas and Huddersfield getting (bigger) fines too? 

[Les Tonks Sidestep]

44 minutes ago, wasginger said:

No chip on my shoulder I can assure you. So who's negligent in the 3 clubs cases. Is it the clubs for not abiding by the protocols set out or is it the S/L or RFL that's at blame, for knowingly letting these clubs get away with their infringements at the time, or have they just discovered the failure of the clubs to follow covid protocols.

They haven't 'got away' with ignoring the protocols though. And investigations actually take time to carry out. 

[M j M]

Are there any clubs out there who don't have a paranoid fringe (ok possibly a paranoid majority) that the RFL are out to get them

[Blind side johnny]

4 hours ago, M j M said:

If you've not got enough Covid cases or contacts you can't just not play. Injuries are a regular part of the game. Covid isn't.

Do you believe that the duty of care requirements for all clubs should be taken into account in such cases or should they simply be required to throw any players into a SL game, no matter what their preparation?

I think that it is a bit too easy to be judgemental in these times.

[M j M]

3 minutes ago, Blind side johnny said:

Do you believe that the duty of care requirements for all clubs should be taken into account in such cases or should they simply be required to throw any players into a SL game, no matter what their preparation?

I think that it is a bit too easy to be judgemental in these times.

I'm not making any judgements at all. 

But Huddersfield can't just make up their own rules or dispute the specified sanctions.

[M j M]

54 minutes ago, wasginger said:

No chip on my shoulder I can assure you. So who's negligent in the 3 clubs cases. Is it the clubs for not abiding by the protocols set out or is it the S/L or RFL that's at blame, for knowingly letting these clubs get away with their infringements at the time, or have they just discovered the failure of the clubs to follow covid protocols.

Sorry but you aren't making any sense now.

[LeeF]

33 minutes ago, M j M said:

Are there any clubs out there who don't have a paranoid fringe (ok possibly a paranoid majority) that the RFL are out to get them

Even Rimmer is convinced the RFL is out to get him

[clogdance]

3 hours ago, Wollo Wollo Wayoo said:

So are the clubs that were denied the fixtures going to be awarded 24-0 wins?

Leigh haven't been we're still on a massive 2 points tally. 

[Red Willow]

1 hour ago, Les Tonks Sidestep said:

Did you miss Cas and Huddersfield getting (bigger) fines too? 

Not missed those, but most clubs have postponed games, yet Salford break training ground protocols?  They didn't wait until a few hours before kick off to call off a game, be interesting to see what other punishments are handed down

[meast]

6 hours ago, OMEGA said:

Harsh on Huddersfield in my opinion, they had 11 senior players out through injury (not Covid) all of whom had surgery for the injury. They had 5 players pulled from their remaining squad to play in the Mid Season England v All Stars match and then had 5 Covid isolations. 

They tried to cancel their match due to being unable to field a squad of sufficient quality and yet are fined for breaching the integrity of the competition! The very thing they were trying to preserve by not fielding a substantially weakened team.

With the one exception of Wigan, no one has played more games than Huddersfield!

And we had players ,like our Captain and marquee player, who we would have liked to have played for us, come back injured from a game we didn't want them to play in.

We could have played the Castleford game with 7 fit senior squad players plus 10 academy players backing up after their game 2 days previously.

Player welfare??

It's beggars belief sometimes!

[M j M]

27 minutes ago, meast said:

And we had players ,like our Captain and marquee player, who we would have liked to have played for us, come back injured from a game we didn't want them to play in.

We could have played the Castleford game with 7 fit senior squad players plus 10 academy players backing up after their game 2 days previously.

Player welfare??

It's beggars belief sometimes!

So what you're saying is you do think there should have been a special ruling just for Huddersfield?

And you think that not having such a ruling is the thing which beggars belief?

[voteronniegibbs]

4 hours ago, DimmestStar said:

Hey what matters is that cheats are punished and Cas haven't been. 

[OMEGA]

41 minutes ago, M j M said:

So what you're saying is you do think there should have been a special ruling just for Huddersfield?

And you think that not having such a ruling is the thing which beggars belief?

What he’s saying is the RFLs own rules contributed heavily to Huddersfield being unable to field a team.

Youth players are not allowed to play 2 games inside of 72 hours, The Giants Academy had played 48 hours earlier which prevented Huddersfield from drawing on those players.

The RFL took 5 players from Huddersfield’s 1st team to play in the England v All Stars game 

The RFL states 7 Covid-19 cases warrant the postponement of a match, an arbitrary number chosen as a one size fits all circumstances amount. Huddersfield had 5 cases but their player shortage was far from normal and had been contributed to by the RFL itself

Added into that were 11 players who’s injury status was not in question as all 11 had undergone surgery for their individual injury. 2 of those were ruled out for the season.

So due to the RFLs own welfare rules, the RFLs one size fits all arbitrary number of Covid cases and the RFL taking 5 Giants players the Huddersfield club were left unable to field a team.

IMO it’s a bit rich for the RFL to place all the blame on the Giants when they were partly, possibly largely responsible for the situation the Giants were in.

 

[Forever Trinity]

17 hours ago, OMEGA said:

Harsh on Huddersfield in my opinion, they had 11 senior players out through injury (not Covid) all of whom had surgery for the injury. They had 5 players pulled from their remaining squad to play in the Mid Season England v All Stars match and then had 5 Covid isolations. 

They tried to cancel their match due to being unable to field a squad of sufficient quality and yet are fined for breaching the integrity of the competition! The very thing they were trying to preserve by not fielding a substantially weakened team.

With the one exception of Wigan, no one has played more games than Huddersfield!

Both Wakefield and Leeds have played more than Huddersfield in addition to Wigan

[OMEGA]

3 hours ago, Forever Trinity said:

Both Wakefield and Leeds have played more than Huddersfield in addition to Wigan

No they haven’t!

 

[Blind side johnny]

15 hours ago, M j M said:

So what you're saying is you do think there should have been a special ruling just for Huddersfield?

And you think that not having such a ruling is the thing which beggars belief?

I think that you are being perverse if you ignore the point being made, and it isn't specifically about Huddersfield but the RFL stance in general.

There has been much emphasis made within the game about duty of care towards the players; quite rightly in my view. To have relatively junior, unproven players thrown straight into a SL standard match in significant numbers is, I believe, ignoring the real hazards that exist in those circumstances. There is no doubt that the Covid regulations are quite specific and necessarily so, but to treat those circumstances in seeming ignorance of other criteria seems at odds, to me at least, with the stance on player welfare. No doubt there is much more that hasn't been revealed in the published judgements, but for forum members to be so simplistically black and white about the matter is disappointing to say the least.

[OriginalMrC]

Whataboutery is rife in RL. Take the punishment and move on rather than worrying about what other clubs have done (and will likely be punished for). All this demonstrates to people is what a shambles super league is. No wonder the game is going down the pan with the behaviour of clubs at the top of the game. 

[Ant]

Looking at what has gone on previously is how you can interpret how the rules will be applied though.

Wasnt there a colossal furore last year when Leeds bailed on going to Catalan just before lockdown? 

No rules in place then but mitigating circumstances accounted for and no charge levelled at Leeds (rightly so imo)

Why not mitigation taken into account here? For the reasons already noted.

It seems, from here, that there has been a huge disparity on how the rules have been applied or how some clubs are treated.