Great stuff, but recently Ben Thaler officiated a game @ the LSV v Barrow and dished out 28 penalties and ruined folks entertainment. No one is condoning foul play,but it was stop start the whole way through. I think BT is better than that but wtf,it should've been better dealt with by a top SL ref.

Are you suggesting he should stop penalising teams if they infringe a lot?

No, but there are many times the ref let's play go when there has been an infringement. Look,the ref could dish out 50 pens in a game if he wants to,but using a bit of common sense can keep the game flowing. I've seen many pens given for holding down in the ruck for 2 to 3 seconds, and none given for holding down for 5 seconds ,get my drift?

I have absolutely no issue with a high penalty count, if they are justified and consistently applied; one would expect that the team breaking the rules the most would suffer a suitable fate - i.e conceding more penalties and subsequently, losing the game. That's not the ref's fault - that's the players fault - but we seem terminally unable to point the finger at our own players in such circumstances.

I was at the Wakefield game on Friday night - the ref made some decisions that, from the stands, were difficult to comprehend; many of which will have been due to player obfuscation, distance, the speed of the action and a total lack of help from line judges - so there's plenty to be improved in terms of referee performance, but I can't see any evidence of biased or one-eyed refereeing. Not even from James Child, who as any fule kno, hates Wakefield.

So was it or wasn't it a penaly? If it was and the TV shows it was then its nobodies fault but your teams. You really do have a bizzare logic at times.

aslong as he gives them both ways

He did give them both ways.
7 in your favour and 5 in Trinity's favour

Having watched the game again, you can't help but place those 2 extra pens...lol
I mean, Shudds got themselves together for a bit and made the most of the pens they received, some were justified, some weren't, but you take the rough with the smooth, Wakey got roughly the same, some justified, some not.
But there were these 2 that looked particularly nuts, both bombs at either end of the field.
Couldn't say if they extended the Shudds revival, but they didn't do it any harm.
Either way, its old news...



As an aside, I kinda feel that some refs work up to pens, an accumulation of the same minor infringement resulting in a pen.
Obviously this is a trade off in the interests of letting the game flow without a peppering of stoppages, this may be why it can appear to be inconsistent refereeing.

7 in your own half not so good as 1 at the death in front of the posts to decide a game

Don't stand 3 metres offside in front of the referee then. There was no way he could ignore it!

You would expect him to know the basics of the game but obviously not, one of supporters that shouts infuriating comments that leaves you scratching your head what he's been watching

So he can only give penalties against you when they don’t hurt you....right.