Whilst I am naturally gutted about the result and more especially the manner of it. I just want to say two things.

Firstly - Well done Dracs on coming back into the play offs after a dreadful start.
Secondly - Well done Saints on getting to the final.

On the official... what can you say? The evidence was clear. Silverwood and his team had a terrible night and the only consistency they showed was in getting calls wrong.

What saddens me is that after last seasons ranting from Bernard Gausch about the standard of officiating in matches involving Dragons, that this just adds fuel to a fire that I genuinely hope doesn't exist.

Whether we think it or not. For the good of the game we have to believe that there was no pre-determined plan to get Dragons out of the play offs due to GF ticket sales.

It's been a brilliant run in from my boys and I am already looking forward to our domestic campaign in France and waiting for next seasons fixtures to come out.

Fact is that every neutral supporter wanted Catalans to win....therefore all the bleating on here and on SKY is purely down to bias towards not getting the result that you wanted.

There were a few contentious decisions that were given in Catalans favour by Silverwood, including the forward pass for the first try, a clear knock on from the winger in the 2nd half that Silverwood said went backwards until touch judge intervention, the tackle on Swift in the air that he didn't give until touch judge intervention, a couple of dangerous throws in succession.

Every fan (or 'neutral' in this case) will always spot the mistakes that are given/ against their team. Also, given that Silverwood is from Leeds it is also highly likely that he would have preferred Saints to lose the game and Catalans to progress to the final.

I usually have a bit of a kip whilst they start forming a scrum or when they have to kick the ball out from behind the try line. Sometimes I read the match programme when you get a 4 man gang tackle and takes about 20 sec to play the ball, if you are lucky you might get longer than a minute from the video ref to justify disallowing a try.

All the officials should be made to come out and say why they were so bad in this game, makes me think the rugby league tell officials to ignor marginal forward passes, off sides, ball strips, knock ons to make sure the game is faster,no ref and linesmen can be that bad in one game .
hope silverwood does not get a big game again a disgrace?

Tbf there were some poor decisions for both teams last night and both, were awarded tries from a forward pass BUT, Saints seemed to get the majority of the 50/50 calls.
They were the better team although the result would probably have been closer had the calls been more even.

As for Sky wanting Catalan to win, I don't think so.
Their commentary team had Catalan written off and back on the plane in the first half.

Cheer up though, you're at Old Trafford next week.

Silverwood and his 'team' were abysmal.

No, it isn't. There were at least 4 clear-cut decisions that went against Catalans in the first 15 minutes while the score was still 0-0, long before Sky started to pick up on it.

- A St Helens knock-on by Luke Thompson on the second tackle of an attacking set that was missed
- Catalans 40/20 attempt when Makinson was well over the touchline but the touch judge didn't flag
- No penalty given for a piggyback on Mounis which forced him to play the ball about 3 meters off the mark
- Decision not referred to the video ref that showed Catalan scored a legitimate try.

Obviously I picked up on these because I wanted Catalan to win but it isn't biased, these were all decisions that Stuart Cummins admitted were wrong that took place in the first 15 minutes of the match and contributed to sapping the team's already depleted energy. If these things went against your team over the course of a game you would be furious, yet all this took place in the first 15 minutes of the match and that's just off the top of my head, I remember getting to 6 blatantly and indisputably wrong calls when I stopped counting and IIRC that was just after Catalans first try (which did come from a forward pass).

Credit to St Helens and they may well have won even with a neutral ref, but if I was a St Helens fan I would feel a little awkward and hollow with the victory TBH.

Doesn't feel hollow at all TBH.

Saints strolled through the game and it was clear very, very early in the match that Saints were grinding them down and it was a matter of time before we opened up a gap, irrespective of refereeing.

Saints were the fresher team because they had earned the right to be over the course of the season, Catalns were cream crackered because they hadn't earned the right to do anything other than consecutive, tough away games.

That's not to say the ref wasn't awful, but Saints approached the game to grind them down and other than one try from a blatant forward and one when the game had gone, Catalans had no answer - bad ref performance or not.

You all wanted Catalan to win, they lost. Now go over the game with your neutral glasses on and pick up on the decisions that went against both sides.

Yeah, I'm not saying St Helens wouldn't have got there anyway or didn't deserve to win, it's just sad to see a game's integrity spoiled in that way.

The general consensus seems to be that Silverwood and his gang had a bloody awful night. Saints possibly deserved to win, but the officials were so bad its taken any shine off Saints performance. Have we actually got a decent referee in Superleague because if we have, he's been off my radar.

Ben Thaler I would say is the best we have at the moment (Widnes fans will disagree I'm sure) and the worst is a toss up between Child and Roby.

You are correct sir. Unless Taia was able to pass the ball through his body cavity, he had the ball under his right arm, and it re-appeared under his left, so it was lost on the floor and regathered.

Not that it mattered as Leeds were poor anyway !

I agree that Leeds were poor, but the problem is that it did matter, it gave Catalans a foothold in a game that was in danger of getting away from them. The ref getting that wrong in the heat of the moment I can live with, but the video ref not seeing something that clear is a real problem. The way it's going it's quite possible that a Grand Final will end up being decided on a call that isn't just incorrect, but as blatantly wrong as that one, or several of those from last night. As I said before, professional full time refs and video referral's were supposed to eliminate the major blunders, but we seem to be seeing more and more of them. It's a real concern.

Edited just to add that Saints deserved their victory regardless of how it came about (though denying that most of the contentious decisions went in their favour is fruitless) and I've been very impressed with Saints all season, they've overcome a huge amount of adversity and I'd like to see them win the whole thing

Silverwood is the Winston Wolfe of Superleague, as proven in last years Grand Final