Blocked When a loan isn't a loan Probably the biggest story in Superleague this week has been Wigan’s decision to block on-loan player Gareth Hock from playing for Widnes against them in this weekends Round Eight encounter at the DW Stadium. A bitter war of words has broken out between Wigan and Widnes coaches, Wane and Betts, about a clause in Hock’s contract which blocks him from playing against the club who hold his registration. READ MORE ON THIS STORY...

Blocked When a loan isn't a loan Probably the biggest story in Superleague this week has been Wigan’s decision to block on-loan player Gareth Hock from playing for Widnes against them in this weekends Round Eight encounter at the DW Stadium. A bitter war of words has broken out between Wigan and Widnes coaches, Wane and Betts, about a clause in Hock’s contract which blocks him from playing against the club who hold his registration. READ MORE ON THIS STORY...

It's not really a story though is it.

When the deal was announced start of season, they made it clear then that he couldn't play against Wigan.

It is poor form from Wigan, but at the end of the day that was the agreement, and why shout about it now and not when it was signed.

Well here we go again coaches putting petrol on the fire the week of a "big" match.

Just like Mcillorian did last week.

Poor school boy antics

Its about as clever as rugby league gets though.

I understand the big daft lad theory on the pitch (I invented it), I even understand the big daft lad theory existign among the coaching fraternity, but in the RFL's press office ?

Do any ex-players work there, do they get monkeys to type for them ?

Widnes agreed to this term to get Hock. They didn't have to agree. No use crying about it now but Betts has always been a bit of a whinger. Mind you Wayne is a bit of a pillock as well. Must be the shared Wigan background.

We didn't get to play Lunt against Hudds (and he could've missed a CC Final had the other Semi finished differently), and it happens in football all the time. Hardly any player on loan is allowed to play against their 'parent club'......complete non-story.

WTF's Betts on about? www1.skysports.com/rugby-league/ ... 6/8577815/ Claiming that wigan's refusal to let Hock play is detrimental to his development is stretching it a bit. I'd have thought that if anything was holding him back it was more likely to be the ban for cocaine, suspensions for sundry misdemeanours on the field, refusal to play etc.

WTF's Betts on about? www1.skysports.com/rugby-league/ ... 6/8577815/ Claiming that wigan's refusal to let Hock play is detrimental to his development is stretching it a bit. I'd have thought that if anything was holding him back it was more likely to be the ban for cocaine, suspensions for sundry misdemeanours on the field, refusal to play etc.

Liam Botham and whilst on loan at the London Broncos in 2004 from the Rhinos scored a try and 4 goals, the last one of which in injury time tied the scores at 36 all if I remember correctly?

It would be interesting to find out exactly how many more loanees from the Rhinos who were allowed to play against us if any?

Wouldn't Kyle Amor's deal at Wakey be another one ?

Think Amors contract ran out and Leeds had first refusal but couldn't really add any clause unless they were keeping him and then loaning him back out. He chose us after that you got no say in the matter.

Scruton scored against us at HQ whilst on loan at HullFC.

Have Leeds ever banned a player out on loan from playing against his parent club? And yes the Botham one did come back to bite, although not quite to the extent Rod Studd claimed this week on SL Backchat.

The Biffs Back 1 - 0 Rod Studd

Don't Leeds reason along the lines of 'they are out on loan to play so what would be the point in preventing them from doing so?'

Not that I can recall.

Look at the Amor example, he was free to play against us. How better to judge a player than against those who's shirt he wants.

In most cases when you send a player out on loan it's because you don't think they're as good as the ones you've currently got. So why would you worry about playing against them?

That's not the case with Hock and Wigan though, so I can see why they wouldn't want him playing against them for Widnes.

If Widnes agreed to the clause at the start of the loan, I'm not sure what their problem is now.

Doesn't the Premier League have it written into its rules that a player cannot play against his parent club while out on loan? Might be worth SL/RFL bobbing something similar in just to prevent this fuss kicking up again.

I'd have thought it would be better if the RFL had a policy in place (one way or the other) rather than leaving it down to the individual clubs to decide on a case by case basis.

Despite Leeds' approach I'd rather all players on loan were banned - as in the case of Lunt last season and Hock this.

Of course its the right thing for him not to play, thinking from Widnes point of view. Why would they want a player playing who might have a bias for the club opposing them and maybe not play as well as they usually would? Of course this could happen all season however, it would be more apparent in a game against the parent club.