Think the other thing apart from the Widnes fans is LSV should never get another international/Cup semi due to how poor the stewards were, they totally failed in the duties they had and weren't enough of them. There's no way those "fans" should have been able to get on the pitch let alone past half way.

The Police (Greater Manchester, I assume?) were also embarrassingly bad, it took 2 minutes for them to get from the corner of the stadium they were in to the Widnes end and then they did nothing but stand around looking gormless.

Until they sort out Stewarding, they shouldn't be allowed show piece events again.

As a neutral who attended both games, it was sad to see the best game and certainly the best atmosphere spoilt by mindless idiots.

Both Castleford and Widnes fans were so vocal throughout and really got behind their team - congrats to the Cas fans for not getting involved and for turning out in such numbers. Spoke to a number of Widnes fans who were genuinely disgusted and embarrassed at the behaviour. I hope they name and shame the culprits.

Best of luck to Cas and Leeds at Wembley, both teams deserved their victory. Hope Leeds fans turn out in higher numbers at Wembley though.

I'm not sure. If you watch some of the other videos it's clear stewards (and police) were drawn to an incident in part of the Widnes end, leaving some of the perimeter of the field without enough protection. The police had to continue dealing with the assault on the steward and disorder at the Widnes end whilst others made their way onto the pitch.
In the end, the number of people entering the pitch exceeded the number of stewards, at which point they are facing a losing battle.
My criticism would be that they stewards near the Cas end did not create a larger 'buffer zone' between the Widnes fans who had entered the pitch and the Castleford supporters in the stand - they should have moved their line to nearer the 20m line to create a bigger distance between the Widnes hooligans and the Cas supporters they were goading, keeping them well out of earshot of each other and certainly too far away to touch each other.
However, the only people to blame are the morons who actually went onto the field and tried to provoke and instigate violence. These are the ones who should suffer the consequences.

It's how stewarding has gone in general these days though. They're nearly always paid crap and with crap conditions and so they aren't going to risk getting smacked by a drunken idiot. Also, if they're like the stewards at Leeds who are mostly provided by G4S, they're probably instructed to not stop anyone who tries to get on.
Although at Leeds there is a team of centrally employed "hard nuts" who are sent to any trouble spot and are more like bouncers in a nightclub. But the regular, orange-jacketed stewards generally just stand by and report anything violent to the "bouncers".

Watching the video posted that was from in the Widnes end, it seemed like there wasn't anyone in control and the stewards there didn't seem sure or confident of what to do.
They needed to take stewards from areas without trouble and concentrate them on the Widnes end.
And they seemed to need something like that team at Leeds that I mentioned to get there quickly.

What's really important here is not the size of the fine but how Widnes as a club and its fans react.

When we got fined in 2000 the club responded by running a name and shame campaign through our local newspaper. CCTV close up images were posted of the large majority of people on the pitch and these people were banned by the club for life and prosecuted by the police. The supporters signed a charter and all put money into paying the clubs fine which I believe was around £50k.

True widnes fans these idiots have dragged your club through the mud, its now important you help identify and drag these idiots names through the mud.

One guy managed to get to the Cas end, and the steward literally stood and watched as he goaded 3k Cas fans. so the rest of them took this non-action as an invitation to all come over. if that one imbecile had been stopped and arrested straight away, because it is BREAKING THE LAW to go onto the pitch, then the rest would have backed off.

The police only came over when they were being pushed back by the Cas players and staff. Carney and Webster were breaking up fights & Daryl Powell put himself and his conditioning coach between himself and the Cas fans, and got a nice few cans thrown at him for his trouble. scumbags, all of them.

Ashamed to be a Widnes fan. The book has to be thrown at the club now, incidents have hardly been few and far between the last couple of years. The worst part is this is something I feared would happen if / when the Vikings lost.

Just to reiterate, rob, jt, is the nicest guy you could meet. Well respected by opposition fans, has all the time for pics and wouldn't harm a fly, was bashed by separate Widnes fans today whilst doing his job in the cas end. I repeat, absolute SCUM

Too be honest not quite as bad as I thought from reading once I looked on You Tube, more mindless morons being, well,...... mindless morons.

Stewarding, from what I've seen was appalling as was the lacadaisical response of the Police. To be honest I think a vigorous response from the boys in blue would have stopped it before it started.

Perhaps a ban from next years CC is in order? But, certainly I think Red Hall needs to look elsewhere for next years semi-final venue.

Amazed that some are wanting to punish the LSV, we shouldn't be planning for trouble, aren't we a supposed to be a civilised society. Five or ten idiots could be expected, but over 100 who break the law by entering the field is not expected and does not happen in RL. If they are expected to foot the bill for a massive stewarding/police operation they won't even bother bidding for games anyway. A large example has to be made of these complete tools and unfortunately the Widnes club

Unfortunatley it was always likely to happen and the R.F.L and Leigh should have been ready for it , everyone saying wow a sell out we can sell more tickets thanWarrington and Leeds , the difference of course being that Widnes sold alot of their allocation to social misfits and not real fans , so next time please make sure it is season ticket holders only for Widnes fans , we may lose 3,000 from the gate but the game and the club will regain credabillity,

I too can't believe some people are blaming the police and the stewards.

Typical of today's attitudes, don't blame those who took the action, blame the people who provide security.

Lets face it as the police walked down the pitch the crowd moved away from them.

Those suggesting that the police charge in and have running battles with members of the public have zero concept of crowd control. But yes lets stick it to what 10 police officers, or some part time low paid stewards, because that's a nice easy concept. I'm sure had the stewards gone in with overkill, we would then have those poor 'innocent' Widnes fans on here talking about heavy handed football style stewarding and not understanding the nature of RL fans.

Responsibility lies with those fans who entered the pitch. Them alone and they should carry all the burden. Don't diminish their responsibility by spreading the blame to others. Why not blame their mothers whilst they are at it, as obviously if they had been better loved or not loved so much they would never have done such a thing.

How sad is it watching fully grown men with some looking old enough to have grand kids acting like pi*sed up 14 year olds?

A real shame for the Widnes club and hopefully they'll be able to get it all sorted pretty quickly. I've got to be honest and say I've never had any issues going to Widnes so this surprised me a little. These big events tend to bring out the bandwagon dregs though which I've seen at numerous Grand Finals.