Sat 10th May: CCSF: Hull KR v Catalans Dragons KO 14:30 (BBC)

[Worzel]

3 hours ago, daz39 said:

I just feel this venue was a lazy choice by the RFL to cater for 1 fan base and to ensure a full house with no regard to any potential Catalans fans (here or abroad) or neutrals.

Er, no, it was one of the few sensible choices they’ve made in years. Two quick questions:

1. What other fan base was there to cater for? York was no harder for Catalans fans to get to, and they didn’t sell their allocation. They’d have had no more fans anywhere else. 

2. How many more neutrals do you seriously expect attend Challenge Cup semi finals? I bet the maximum who would is in the very low hundreds, probably not even 100 if we’re honest, so the impact of the match’s location on increasing that versus 8,000 Hull KR fans would be negligible.

This entire argument boils down to: “it irritates me that Hull KR won in front of their fans, and I would have liked to have made it more difficult for Rovers fans to attend a semi final, just because, er, well I would.”

[Harry Stottle]

9 minutes ago, Worzel said:

Er, no, it was one of the few sensible choices they’ve made in years. Two quick questions:

1. What other fan base was there to cater for? York was no harder for Catalans fans to get to, and they didn’t sell their allocation. They’d have had no more fans anywhere else. 

2. How many more neutrals do you seriously expect attend Challenge Cup semi finals? I bet the maximum who would is in the very low hundreds, probably not even 100 if we’re honest, so the impact of the match’s location on increasing that versus 8,000 Hull KR fans would be negligible.

This entire argument boils down to: “it irritates me that Hull KR won in front of their fans, and I would have liked to have made it more difficult for Rovers fans to attend a semi final, just because, er, well I would.”

You are correct on your second point, you recently mentioned the LSV as a bad alternative, I live a mile or so away and I wouldn't have been tempted to attend.

[up the robins]

31 minutes ago, Wollo Wollo Wayoo said:

No disrespect mate but there's an e in Wakefield and it's their stadium not there.

Should really check back before posting or stop posting while trying to do jobs at the same time.

[Szymala]

30 minutes ago, Just Browny said:

While replacing him with another winger who is way over the hill.

He's just injured that's all. Cowboys' all-time record try-scorer Feldt will come good.

[Just Browny]

35 minutes ago, Szymala said:

He's just injured that's all. Cowboys' all-time record try-scorer Feldt will come good.

He looked pretty poor when he wasnt injured but I expect that four months of youth he has over Makinson will make all the difference.

[dkw]

Years of complaining the rfl never took into account the distance fans travel to daft neutral grounds, and now the rfl are wrong to have taken it into account? It was a sensible decision, why make kr fans travel hours, the ground makes no difference to catalans unless it was in France.

[Ullman]

3 hours ago, Old Frightful said:

Choosing York catered both for Hull KR fans and potential Catalans fans.

After all, it's about the same distance from East Hull as it it is West Hull, where the vast majority of people supporting Catalans yesterday are based.

Should have played it at the MKM.

[RigbyLuger]

1 hour ago, dkw said:

Years of complaining the rfl never took into account the distance fans travel to daft neutral grounds, and now the rfl are wrong to have taken it into account? It was a sensible decision, why make kr fans travel hours, the ground makes no difference to catalans unless it was in France.

Moaning for the sake of moaning, (Not you )

Edited May 11 by RigbyLuger

[Old Frightful]

1 hour ago, Ullman said:

Should have played it at the MKM.

We'd have lost as usual.

[Ullman]

3 hours ago, Old Frightful said:

We'd have lost as usual.

Good point.

[Father Ted]

On 10/05/2025 at 08:28, minch said:

It's impossible over a 80 minute game to not concede a single penalty or 6 again......

No it isn't!

Leigh didn't concede a single penalty when they beat  the Warriors 0-1 at Wigan. Also there's no record of Huddersfield conceding a penalty when they played at Wigan earlier this season.

[The Phantom Horseman]

Steve McNamara has reportedly been asked by the RFL to "explain his comments" following his press conference after the semi final.

This will be a fairly open-and-shut case, you'd think: section C:2:12 of the Operational guidelines clearly states:

"No Person Subject to these Operational Rules shall make any public statement (written or oral) or cause to be published or post online material or content which contains criticism of the character of a Match Official or criticism of the manner in which a Match Official has officiated at a Match (whether a Match in which the Club or Player has taken part, or of any other game under the control or subject to the jurisdiction of the RFL"

As well as the inevitable fine McNamara will receive, to cover all bases the thing I'd really like to see (though it won't happen I'm sure) is for the RFL, or indeed an enterprising journalist, to invite McNamara to review the game over the 80 minutes and produce a list of the incidents he thought should have seen penalties awarded to Catalans, and for those incidents to be examined to see if there was anything remiss in the way in which the game was officiated. My guess is that there will be few, if any, clear-cut incidents, but it would be interesting to see an attempt at an independent review.

The reason I say this is that whilst it's unusual for a team to concede zero, or even 1 or 2, penalties, it's by no means totally implausible, and McNamara seems to be implying that every team is entitled to receive a number of penalties, this is "fan talk" really in my opinion, you'll often hear fans moaning about a "lop-sided penalty count" impying that the ref's job is to dish out a similar number of penalties to each side whereas his job is to officiate each play as he sees it.

So here's a challenge TotalRL journos and all, if you manage to get McNamara to do this I promise one story I WOULD click on would be this one -"The top 5 incidents McNamara thought should have been penalties to Catalans (you won't believe number 4!)"

[Barley Mow]

21 minutes ago, The Phantom Horseman said:

Steve McNamara has reportedly been asked by the RFL to "explain his comments" following his press conference after the semi final.

This will be a fairly open-and-shut case, you'd think: section C:2:12 of the Operational guidelines clearly states:

"No Person Subject to these Operational Rules shall make any public statement (written or oral) or cause to be published or post online material or content which contains criticism of the character of a Match Official or criticism of the manner in which a Match Official has officiated at a Match (whether a Match in which the Club or Player has taken part, or of any other game under the control or subject to the jurisdiction of the RFL"

As well as the inevitable fine McNamara will receive, to cover all bases the thing I'd really like to see (though it won't happen I'm sure) is for the RFL, or indeed an enterprising journalist, to invite McNamara to review the game over the 80 minutes and produce a list of the incidents he thought should have seen penalties awarded to Catalans, and for those incidents to be examined to see if there was anything remiss in the way in which the game was officiated. My guess is that there will be few, if any, clear-cut incidents, but it would be interesting to see an attempt at an independent review.

The reason I say this is that whilst it's unusual for a team to concede zero, or even 1 or 2, penalties, it's by no means totally implausible, and McNamara seems to be implying that every team is entitled to receive a number of penalties, this is "fan talk" really in my opinion, you'll often hear fans moaning about a "lop-sided penalty count" impying that the ref's job is to dish out a similar number of penalties to each side whereas his job is to officiate each play as he sees it.

So here's a challenge TotalRL journos and all, if you manage to get McNamara to do this I promise one story I WOULD click on would be this one -"The top 5 incidents McNamara thought should have been penalties to Catalans (you won't believe number 4!)"

If McNamara did this with a journalist and highlighted a number of incidents he thought were called incorrectly by the ref, wouldn't he be inviting a second charge under section C:2:12 of the Operational guidelines?

[The Phantom Horseman]

8 minutes ago, Barley Mow said:

If McNamara did this with a journalist and highlighted a number of incidents he thought were called incorrectly by the ref, wouldn't he be inviting a second charge under section C:2:12 of the Operational guidelines?

Yes you're right. I started off just intending to put that the RFL should invite him to do so, but then got carried away by what a great clickbait article it would make!

On a more serious note...I think what should happen in situations like this where a coach feels aggrieved is that he should have the facility to cite a number of individual decisions that he thinks went against his team and submit them to the RFL for review, rather than openly criticise the officiating team at a press conference after the game.

Edited May 13 by The Phantom Horseman

[LeeF]

3 hours ago, The Phantom Horseman said:

Yes you're right. I started off just intending to put that the RFL should invite him to do so, but then got carried away by what a great clickbait article it would make!

On a more serious note...I think what should happen in situations like this where a coach feels aggrieved is that he should have the facility to cite a number of individual decisions that he thinks went against his team and submit them to the RFL for review, rather than openly criticise the officiating team at a press conference after the game.

He’s got previous for using press conferences to criticise match officials when deflecting from a poor performance by a team coached by him