A number of the stewards at Langtree were actually from Warrington.

Not sure about the ones on the pitch, but definitely recognised a few that stood toward the back of West stand.

Spot on lefty

If it's a crime, its for the police to sort out. Widnes RLFC aren't a law enforcement body.

Looking at those videos the perpetrators seem to be nearly all males, late teens or 20s. And I expect close to 100% of them were tanked up with alcohol.

I bet you could take a selection of this 'demographic' from every rugby league playing city/town in the UK and if they didn't have club shirts on you would not be able to tell who supported who.

Its the same demographic that was out in those August 2011 riots nicking trainers and smashing up shops. The problem is they think strength in numbers protects them and they aren't afraid of the police so they do what they like.

The solution is to amp up the security significantly: if you have a tough and vicious enough presence then yes you might get moaning about 'heavy handed stewarding' but you won't get this.

People say there aren't jobs for ex-squaddies when they leave the army, well I would love to hire a load of unemployed ex-squaddies as private security for sporting events, they would soon deal with these kind of fools.

The quality of the Tv cameras used by the BBC are powerful enough to identify 'ALL' the morons that invaded the pitch and caused the trouble,have the police demand the films and hound down these idiots.

Those videos on the previous page are embarrassing - The Widnes fans are bad enough, but the Castleford fans chanting 'Yorkshire, Yorkshire' in their best Emmerdale accents, while doing various lewd hand signals, just show why RL will always be looked down upon from the mainstream media.

The next time we have a debate on here about why RU is given preferential treatment in the media over RL, we just need to watch those clips and there will be the answer.

This is the type of thing that happens on student 'protests', where there are always stories of "police brutality", "human rights abuses". Someone will be giving it large to the police in a V for Vendetta mask, repeatedly refuse to co-operate and then try to resist arrest with force and then the police will start rough handling them and its all over the internet.

In practice the police probably knew what they were doing with this Widnes pitch invasion. They weren't actually a direct threat to anyone, they were just moping around like losers on the pitch. If they had any nous about them they would have pulled their scarves over their faces like the 'ultras' do to hide their identities but they were too thick to even do that, they just paraded their faces for the cameras for easier identification.

And they ended up getting "que sera sera....we're going to Wembley" sung at them by the Cas fans. They weren't exactly on to a winner going up waving chanting Widnes, when they'd just got beat, they didn't even have anything to taunt the Cas fans with. They just went up to get laughed at and look like tools and now its on the internet too

Yes its embarassing for the game but its pretty embarassing for the guys that did it. I suppose they thought they were being hard and doing some kind of colonial claiming of territory going on the pitch with a Widnes flag, but everyone knew Widnes had just got beat.

Can't we dock them sufficient points to put Bradford above them? I know who'd rather have in SL.

You get a better curry in Bradford too.

Now that would be interesting if they were docked 10 points this season.
If they get docked 4 points next year they will unlikely make the cut.

You are easily amused.
If Wire had won the other semi-final and a gang of marauding Leeds fans invaded our end of the pitch whilst the team were celebrating with the fans, would you have found that amusing?
You obviously forget the occasion when a Widnes fan intervened in a touchline melee and got thumped by Desi Drummond in the confusion. That cost Desi his tour place all due to some mindless moron invading the pitch.
This has happened with Widnes numerous times now and every time it happens the RL and Widnes issue pious platitudes and promise action but what have they achieved? It is time an example was made of both the club and it's supporters.
There is ample video evidence to identify and prosecute the offenders.
The above also applies to the brain dead faction in the Wire ranks and it is pleasing to see that the majority on this board not only don't condone the conduct but vehemently condemn it.

Your arguement doesn't really stand, as football is seen as the god of sports, and i'm pretty sure you get 'lewd hand gestures' at football... unless you were specifically referring to the 'Yorkshire' part, in which case, as we already knew, the southern-centric media hates Northerners.

lighten up. nobody got hurt and as long as Wire fans don't embarrass us I couldn't care any less if it was leeds fans!
Like I said nobody got hurt. And the Castleford fans certainly got some entertainment judging by the amount of youtube videos they all have taken.

No-one got hurt? Tell that to the female that one Widnes fan sparked out with a punch.

I think it's obvious I haven't seen or read about it.
That is terrible.
I still didn't condone the event but some of the footage I found funny. Junior children running on to the pitch making airplanes with their arms still doesn't hurt nobody.
That idiot that punched deserves custody.

I laughed at one kid running about one yard onto the grass, slipping on his and then gingerly retreating back over the hoardings