Sun 13th Aug: SL: St Helens v Huddersfield Giants KO 17:00

[The Blues Ox]

When did the rule get introduced that Lomax only has to go back 5 yards when defending? 

This is exactly the sort of thing why there needs to be a video ref at every game. Both replays seem to indicate direct contact to the head of the Hudds player yet Hudds lose a player because of the reaction.

[Saint Toppy]

12 hours ago, daz39 said:

What a weird afternoon that was....2 penalties?? given against us in front of the sticks for SAINTS knock-ons, Matty English sin-binned, Saints players actually stopping completely till Thaler gave 6 again then carried on playing,then we have Joe Greenwood seeing red for retaliating to Lees smashing him in the throat, followed by Knowles punching him then flopping an elbow on him on the ground but yet nothing, not even a word with either of the Saints thugs, looking at the video they will probably both get banned but i'm sure Well(ingup)ens will make sure they are deemed acceptable,

We come out in the 2nd half a man down and absolutely school Saints and make it a 2 point ball game with 7 to go, with 13 men or even Saints down to 12 as should have been i reckon we would have won that.

Super proud of my teams effort against the adversity we had to overcome today, even the Saints fans after the game said the Ref gave them everything and they were lucky to escape with the 2 points, ah well onwards and upwards, can't win em all.

 Comedy post of the day, trying to make out Huddersfield were some sort of victims 

Both penalties were for Hudds player gobbing off to the Ref

The English Cannonball tackle was appalling and was a red card all day long. Percival was being held up by 2 players and no longer moving then English comes flying in and dives straight at his knees. He deserves a lengthy ban fort that. Its not a reaction tackle and not mis-timed, he had several seconds to decide, he knew exactly what he was doing. He could have aimed for his back or ribs if he'd wanted to hurt him with a legal tackle but he chose to aim for his knees to injure him.

As for the Lees / Greenwood incident, can't see anything wrong with Lees tackle what so ever. Greenwood turn his shoulder as he goes into contact and just get rocked back by a good hard tackle. He takes exception to being hit hard and lashes out with his elbow straight into Lee's face. Knowles was stupid for then lashing out and will probably get a charge, though his only saving grace may be that it didn't appear to make contact with Greenwoods head it looks like he misses and hits his shoulder, but the intent was there.

Hill can count himself very luck not have had further punishment in that game. In the 1st minute he hits Ritson straight in the head with a swinging arm, forcing Ritson off for a HIA. Ritson was falling in the tackle but it was still a swinging arm with direct head contact that resulted in a player leaving the field injured. Based on whats been happening all season that should have been a yellow. He than had another one late on in the 2nd half on Delaney. When a player puts their hand up an apologises straight away like Hill did they know they've got it badly wrong yet all he got was a warning from Thaler saying keep the tackles down.

From that game i'd be expecting to see both Hill & Knowles pick up 1 match bans and Greenwoood & English to be getting at least 3-4 match bans. Wouldn't be surprised to see Connor also get a charge for gobbing off to the officials. 

[Saint Toppy]

11 hours ago, yipyee said:

Huddersfield had the bigger pack and saints bench were poor, LMS past it, Royle and Norman useless and Davies not winning any fans with his performance or lack of passing!

Positive is Ritson looks to have learned to defend and did well against the much larger goulding 

Kevin and conner superb for Huddersfield. 

Poor decision from Wellens to pick 2 clearly unfit players on the bench in LMS & Batchelor, especially when your 3rd forward on the bench is a useless donkey like Norman. I reckon my mam could easily tackle Norman and she's in her 80's and partially sighted 

Kev was great for Hudds in attack & defense and I wish Saints still had him instead of Hopahurty who's busy keeping the treatment table warm yet again. As for Connor, he looked good for about 20-25mins in the 2nd half but was largely anonymous for the rest of the game, well except for gobbing off to the officials and the completely lame attempted tackle on Makinson for his first try. 

[Harry Stottle]

5 minutes ago, Saint Toppy said:

As for the Lees / Greenwood incident, can't see anything wrong with Lees tackle what so ever.

I would wager the disciplinary do.

And another general observation from this game and recent Saints ones that I have seen, undoubtedly and without question Welsby must be the best linking and distribution full back in the British game, but on the other hand he must be the worst one on one defensive full back out there, I don't need to get into a discussion with that opinion the evidence has been there in recent games both on televised games and highlights. Would I have him I  my team, off course in the blink of an eye. 

[Saint Toppy]

43 minutes ago, Harry Stottle said:

I would wager the disciplinary do.

And another general observation from this game and recent Saints ones that I have seen, undoubtedly and without question Welsby must be the best linking and distribution full back in the British game, but on the other hand he must be the worst one on one defensive full back out there, I don't need to get into a discussion with that opinion the evidence has been there in recent games both on televised games and highlights. Would I have him I  my team, off course in the blink of an eye. 

I'm still not convinced FB is Welsby's best position TBH I'd prefer to see him playing at 6 and being a lot more involved. He's not a bad defensive FB, actually he's pretty strong and has pulled of numerous try saving tackles, including a brilliant one yesterday on Golding I think it was as he dove for the corner. Where Welsby still has a lot to learn is his positioning as a FB. Having said that people seem to forget how young he still is and he's still fairly green when it comes to playing at FB reach week. Last season he spent almost all the year at 6 when Dodd got injured and its only this season he's been playing regularly in the FB position. I'd be getting concerned of he was still making these defensive errors 2-3 years down the track but for now i'm prepared to cut him a bit of slack with some of these defensive mistakes, especially as he's more than made up for it with some of his attacking abilities. He created 2 and scored 1 of the 5 try's yesterday even though overall I don't think he had a particularly great game. 

[WN83]

Extremely tough to get conclusive proof from watching a full speed youtube video and trying to pause it at the correct point but it looks like Lees makes contact with his head to me. If that game is on TV, I suspect Lees would've walked tbh. I can't help but go back to Joe Shorrocks red card in the cup semi. I had no issue with the red because those challenges are being red carded but realistically they're being red carded when the games are on TV and the VR can look at numerous slow motion replays. The Morgan Knowles stuff on the floor are just things he can't help himself with but there didn't look much in it and I doubt any action will come his way (I don't think Lees will face action either tbh, as they don't like to go against the officials on field decisions). 

 

As for Greenwood, well it's soft isn't it but it's the position the game finds itself in. A reaction like that will get a red, so the best course of action is to hit the deck and play dead. 

[Saint Toppy]

And people complained about Wellens !!!

Watson is a coach who's failing miserably and knows his time is nearly up. Spouting utter rubbish to deflect from his own inadequacies.

According to him Greenwood just 'pushed out' and English should just have 'kept his feet a bit longer' and was 'just trying to bring a big man down'  

This interview is nothing short of ebarrassing 

https://t.co/HzfuUPZo5m

 

[Lowdesert]

31 minutes ago, Saint Toppy said:

And people complained about Wellens !!!

Watson is a coach who's failing miserably and knows his time is nearly up. Spouting utter rubbish to deflect from his own inadequacies.

According to him Greenwood just 'pushed out' and English should just have 'kept his feet a bit longer' and was 'just trying to bring a big man down'  

This interview is nothing short of ebarrassing 

https://t.co/HzfuUPZo5m

 

Lees 2 matches

[daz39]

2 match ban for Saint Lees and no ban for Greenwood, cue the saints lot saying the RFL have it in for them and are not protecting their players!.

It was pretty obvious at the game something happened to make Joe use his elbow, shame we didn't benefit from Lees thuggery on the field as Saints next 2 opponents do....

[johnh1]

Not for the first time that Lees has got away with thuggery during a game. Salford lost a player, as did Huddersfield. Yet Saints think they are hard done by.

[meast]

So Lees isn't a Saint and it wasn't a great hit as their fans are claiming.

And it appears Greenwood got sent off for reacting to a bad high tackle, so much for protecting players eh Wellens?

I imagine he'll be banning or Fining Lees then for not protecting Joe Greenwood?

 

 

[meast]

2 hours ago, Saint Toppy said:

And people complained about Wellens !!!

Watson is a coach who's failing miserably and knows his time is nearly up. Spouting utter rubbish to deflect from his own inadequacies.

According to him Greenwood just 'pushed out' and English should just have 'kept his feet a bit longer' and was 'just trying to bring a big man down'  

This interview is nothing short of ebarrassing 

https://t.co/HzfuUPZo5m

 

Your post is utter rubbish, Watson's time is nowhere near up, he's been vindicated though as the disciplinary have deemed Lees was the aggressor and Greenwood was reacting to that.

It's getting a bit embarrassing the way some St Helens fans are calling out other coaches and players yet once again the opposition have been proved right and vindicated.

Fwiw though, I don't agree with Coaches or players coming out and saying stuff but in fairness most of the media stuff is either taken out of context or it's a direct answer to a direct question rather than a simple "Watson's moaning" etc.

 

[Harry Stottle]

6 hours ago, Saint Toppy said:

As for the Lees / Greenwood incident, can't see anything wrong with Lees tackle what so ever.

Got that one wrong Toppy, or it could be that  you have become accustomed to Lee's tackling technique.

How many times has Lees been banned this year, perhaps Wellens should consider player's of other clubs welfare and stop picking him, Wellens will be forever remembered for his outburst the other week against a player who was doing nothing illegal whilst player's under his jurisdictional guidance have been picking up bans all season.

[Johnny Ringo]

18 hours ago, yipyee said:

Huddersfield had the bigger pack and saints bench were poor, LMS past it, Royle and Norman useless and Davies not winning any fans with his performance or lack of passing!

Positive is Ritson looks to have learned to defend and did well against the much larger goulding 

Kevin and conner superb for Huddersfield. 

Haven't seen the game but Ritson always could defend at Barrow. He is naturally a right sided winger so a little uncomfortable on the left, he first played one season on the left at Barrow and was decent but when Barrow switched him to the right he totally he nailed it. 

[hullste]

2 hours ago, meast said:

Your post is utter rubbish, Watson's time is nowhere near up, he's been vindicated though as the disciplinary have deemed Lees was the aggressor and Greenwood was reacting to that.

It's getting a bit embarrassing the way some St Helens fans are calling out other coaches and players yet once again the opposition have been proved right and vindicated.

Fwiw though, I don't agree with Coaches or players coming out and saying stuff but in fairness most of the media stuff is either taken out of context or it's a direct answer to a direct question rather than a simple "Watson's moaning" etc.

 

I've watched the challenge a few times and can't tell if it is direct contact to the head or not. The MRP have deemed it was so inevitable that he copped a ban. I think they have been very lenient with Greenwood, Hill and Knowles however I can't believe that the cannonball tackle by English only resulted in a warning. It was an awful challenge, the worst by far in the game and totally unnecessary, luckily Percival avoided serious injury. If it had been a Saints player I'm convinced he would have copped a heavy ban.

[johnh1]

I’ve watched the challenge a few times as well. And it is clear that Lees attacked Greenwood with a shoulder to the head. A typical Lees challenge. A clear red card. Unless you are a Saints player, of course. Lees has now ended Shane Wright’s season and ended Greenwood’s participation in that game. And he only gets a two game ban, both times. Benefitting other teams instead of Salford and Huddersfield who were the teams he offended against. The disciplinary ought to have have given him a season ending ban. Why hasn’t Wellens appeared, head shaking, criticising the disciplinary for not taking stronger action against a player who repeatedly makes illegal tackles, designed to seriously injure opponents? Rather than criticising players making perfectly legal tackles against his precious Saints players?

[Chris22]

I've watched the Lees challenge a few times and I struggle to see the point of contact. The panel must have better footage than I have seen and Lees flew in recklessly so hard to grumble too much.

But I do take issue with English not being suspended. It is an illegal tackle, he also flew to the challenge in a reckless manner deliberately attacking the joint of a player who was in a vulnerable position. Far worse that the one that saw Luke Yates banned at Magic Weekend.

[meast]

14 hours ago, hullste said:

I've watched the challenge a few times and can't tell if it is direct contact to the head or not. The MRP have deemed it was so inevitable that he copped a ban. I think they have been very lenient with Greenwood, Hill and Knowles however I can't believe that the cannonball tackle by English only resulted in a warning. It was an awful challenge, the worst by far in the game and totally unnecessary, luckily Percival avoided serious injury. If it had been a Saints player I'm convinced he would have copped a heavy ban.

The English one looked bad but on seeing a replay, it did look like the contact was higher, around the hips, it was still dangerous and reckless though and I wouldn't have been unhappy had he received a ban, there wasn't much need for it.

We all said at the game though that Greenwood reacted to a high , couldn't see who it was, but most Giants fans were perplexed when there was no card for Saints.

I don't think Knowles punched but rather slapped the shoulder but it was a swinging arm so maybe?

Can't comment on Hill as I was too far away and haven't seen a replay.

Either way, it's done now, Saints got the win eventually, who knows what the result may have been had we played with 13 instead of 12?

[daz39]

1 hour ago, meast said:

The English one looked bad but on seeing a replay, it did look like the contact was higher, around the hips, it was still dangerous and reckless though and I wouldn't have been unhappy had he received a ban, there wasn't much need for it.

We all said at the game though that Greenwood reacted to a high , couldn't see who it was, but most Giants fans were perplexed when there was no card for Saints.

I don't think Knowles punched but rather slapped the shoulder but it was a swinging arm so maybe?

Can't comment on Hill as I was too far away and haven't seen a replay.

Either way, it's done now, Saints got the win eventually, who knows what the result may have been had we played with 13 instead of 12?

Or Saints played with 12 too as they should have.

Apparently though according to Saints fans, Mr Thaler and their head coach we only have to protect players who wear a red V, others are obviously fair game.

[daz39]

2 match ban for Lees upheld after appeal, on Redvee.net they are actually convinced the RFL treat them bad and are actually suggesting getting lawyers in to have a look, maybe their players are just dirty B******* !!!!!

[sam4731]

It's interesting, a lot (not all) on this forum argue that retaliating is as bad if not worse than the incident itself. How many complaints that Greenwood got a B versus Lees' C. I'm not saying either is deserved or undeserved, I'd just be interested to know if those people still hold those views.

[daz39]

1 minute ago, sam4731 said:

It's interesting, a lot (not all) on this forum argue that retaliating is as bad if not worse than the incident itself. How many complaints that Greenwood got a B versus Lees' C. I'm not saying either is deserved or undeserved, I'd just be interested to know if those people still hold those views.

You could argue by being sent from the field Greenwood/Huddersfield were served their punishment on the day, for some unknown reason the officials chose not to punish Lees at the same time, unfortunately Saints next 2 opponents get the benefit of his thuggery while we suffered on the day because of it.

[sam4731]

2 minutes ago, daz39 said:

You could argue by being sent from the field Greenwood/Huddersfield were served their punishment on the day, for some unknown reason the officials chose not to punish Lees at the same time, unfortunately Saints next 2 opponents get the benefit of his thuggery while we suffered on the day because of it.

Fair enough. Well argued point

[LeeF]

1 hour ago, daz39 said:

2 match ban for Lees upheld after appeal, on Redvee.net they are actually convinced the RFL treat them bad and are actually suggesting getting lawyers in to have a look, maybe their players are just dirty B******* !!!!!

Redvee are just on neat Kool Aid from early in the day. They have completely lost it this season (more than in previous years)

[sam4731]

On 14/08/2023 at 10:34, The Blues Ox said:

When did the rule get introduced that Lomax only has to go back 5 yards when defending? 

This is exactly the sort of thing why there needs to be a video ref at every game. Both replays seem to indicate direct contact to the head of the Hudds player yet Hudds lose a player because of the reaction.

Oh god we can't get to a place where the VR is judging the individual offsides on every tackle.