Not postponed or covid related but, forfeited due to lack of fit players ??

A 24 - 0 victory for Wire

Has this EVER happened before and surely a fine or other punishment coming Salford's way ?

Wire will now play Huddersfield.

When you consider that Salford could have just loaned a team from Oldham or Rochdale it does seem quite bizarre.

I understand why Salford have done this from a player welfare perspective. However Ian Blease rubbed me the wrong way with his calls for a draft system. This incident has shown up how little player development Salford actually do.

Salford seem to be a microcosm of Society at present. Providing nothing then asking for an equal share because it is "fair" when in fact them getting nothing would be actually be "fair".

Given that, 2020 is messed up and Salford should not be punished for what are freak circumstances.

I'm not sure if I agree with you.

Trinity and Cas, who seem to be among the worst affected with covid absentees, have played with heavily weakened sides, just to complete their fixtures and while covid is very much "out of a clubs control", injuries are part and parcel of the game.

If their squad was carrying injuries and was then further hit with multiple "covid omissions" then, I would agree with you but, it would appear that this isn't the case.

Wire get a "freebie" here, both in terms of league points but also, meaning that they have one less game to play, which gifts them an advantage over the other clubs chasing a play off spot and for this alone there has to be some penalty.

Can clubs still bring players in on loan ?

I think lack of the use of 'loan' players is more about maintaining bubbles (although some clubs don't appear to have been very good at this so far).

You expect part-time players who haven't trained to step up and play a Super League game?
Right.

It’s just becoming laughable now. No wonder sky are cutting a quarter off the tv rights. Just let the big 3 of saints, Wigan and Leeds play a round robin tournament to decide who wins superleague. At least people will tune in and watch that

It will be interesting to see in a couple of weeks whether this result has any influence on the playoffs

The situation is only going to get worse so the sooner we can wrap up the season the better before it deteriorates any further.

I’ve not seen anything about a potential start in 2021 which realistically could be as late as Easter.

It's certainly becoming difficult but, how on earth do you justify Leeds taking part ??
Might as well stick Bradford in there, just for old times sake.

The sport has to be good enough and clever enough to see the season out in some kind of reasonable order.

Next season could certainly start with just as many, if not more, difficulties.
Our clown government went from having some control over the virus, to losing it and we look way more likely to have another full lockdown that we ever do to having spectators back through the turnstiles, without which, every sport, apart from Premier League Football, is in serious jeopardy.

It was probably more about deliberately leaving Warrington out.

I don't see the RFL compliance unit has particularly strong grounds to punish Salford, the constraints they are operating under are self-evident facts, and could not reasonably have been foreseen when the season was originally being planned. The rescheduling of the CC was done by the RFL, and that has ultimately led to difficulties in fulfilling SL fixtures. It's not feasible to pull in random players from the lower leagues who haven't played for months, not on salary cap grounds and not on Covid security grounds. The RFL has a duty to consider player welfare as well as the clubs. As for some clubs being in a stronger position to fall back on academies and reserves; that's a long-term issue that the RFL is already aware of.

Interestingly, if Catalan win their next few games and can get past the 15 matches needed to qualify, they could go into the play offs relatively fresh, perhaps having played 5 or 6 games less than the other sides in the semi finals.
Apart from still having to travel, this would be a huge advantage for them.

Then, one decent performance and they're in the GF

Although the last 3 SL winners were Leeds, Wigan and St Helens.

For perspective..... here's a post taken from the Salford fans site....

[i"Looking at our fixtures for October and scheduled for November is an absolute joke

October 3rd, 8th, 13th, 17th, 23rd, 26th, 30th (7 games in 27 days)
November 2nd, 6th, 8th, 12th (4 games in 10 days)

Total 11 games in 40 days with one of the smallest squads in Super League.

It's amazing we've managed to fulfil our fixtures so far. Super League and the RFL have a duty of care to the players and any punishment would show then up for what they are."[/i

I'd argue not one SL club could cope with that fixture list, let alone one with the smallest squad. Still, at least the mighty Wire have managed to avoid a 6th consecutive beating at the hands of little old Salford.