Quote: Gazemous "The perpetrators were committing a criminal offence. Just requires the police to review the evidence and make some arrests. Seems a pretty simple solution really.
As for preventative measures, I'm not entirely sure you can blame the Widnes club. As has been said, all clubs have a select group of morons - in any large group of people you will have some morons, that's just life. The question is, how do you prevent morons from committing criminal acts?
I'd suggest visible police presence is the main thing. I've been at other sporting events where a significant, visible police presence will make itself apparent towards the end of the event. That didn't happen yesterday - the stewards stood around being threatened. They need serious backup, especially at emotive games like a semi-final, and more so when alcohol is involved - as every single video shot of those Widnes fans showed it was yesterday.
So fwiw, I think the RFL need to learn some valuable lessons here and start working closer with organisations who know how to police a big crowd to prevent things like this happening. Education needs to be better in ensuring fans know that if they break the law, they will get a criminal record. Most importantly, those people who do break the law, whether it's encroaching on the pitch or assaulting a mascot, need to be sat in front of a judge.
I'm not convinced on what punishing the Widnes club will achieve, it'll only punish the people who are ashamed of what happened yesterday, not the ones who perpetrated it.'"
Broadcasters and particularly sponsors will expect to see strong action taken by the RFL. As daft and pointless as it may sometimes seem, it is pretty much all they can do at the moment. I do agree about learning lessons about staging big games and working with he various organisations involved, but that won't stop the idiots getting ed up and causing trouble. If a large contingent of trouble makers want to invade the pitch, and there was abut 100 of them yesterday, it will be difficult to stop them. I'm sure there will be a few prosecutions, but can't see that solving the problem either. It seems to be a larger issue with society and has been for decades. Only football style policing can stop it and that will be way too expensive for most, if not all, Rugby League clubs.
