Russell Smith once said at a charity night. That was his biggest ever mistake .

He did. Fair play to Smith for holding his hands up but Billy Thompson never did.
He ruled Phil Ford, who never had a hand touch him as he rounded in behind the tryline a few more feet to make the kick easier had stepped over the dead ball line.
Utter rubbish, he was almost a metre within it!

For those of you who are lucky enough not to be old enough to have been there or remembered it, it was an era when Hull was so good that only the Wigan of the late 80's have seen a team that would rival it.

I was stood at the Stanneylands side of the Fletcher End and Fordy was nowhere near the dead ball line. The two Hull players who were nearest to him didn't appeal and were on their way under the posts for the conversion. Old Billy made sure we lost that day.

Its easy to say after the event, but I was raging with him for months after that, in fact still do when I think about it now and I was only 14 at the time!

I was there that day, I was so convinced we were on our way to Wembley that year I had already bought my ticket, unbelievable day is how I would describe it.

Thompson cost us a place in the CC semi final, smith cost us the TITLE with a decision which everybody(including the man himself)has said was incorrect. It will never go away in my head. Just think, we wouldn't be listening to that annoying chant of "have you ever seen the wire win the league" from the pie eaters if it wasn't for Russell Smith.

Was right at the front of the Fletcher end, scalf round my wrist, biggest crowd Ive ever seen at Wilderspool.

Then Billy Thompson cheated, quite why or how I have no idea but never ever have I seen something like that on a sporting field since.

gutted didn't even cover it.......

at least we robbed the taxman IIRC the offical attendance was around 11,000 ....course it was..

I could live with The Wigan one, wigan always got those decisions it wasnt cheating it was just being swayed by the presence of the club, players, and fans of Wigan. It was weak refereeing by on the whole a very good referee in Russel Smith.

Billy Thompson however is a turd of a man.

I thought you were referring to Bob Eccles disallowed try when he kicked through, touched down and was given offside, unless I'm thinking of another outrageous decision.

I guess there was nearer 16000 in that day.
One of the first games I remember that changing ends was forbidden.

Take your pick. There were 4 of them.

iirc, we played Hull KR at home, a few weeks later (severely depleted, with Mick Blacker and Gary Stephens as HBs on loan, as we literally had no players left), and guess who was reffing that night. Yes, the one and only Biased Billy Thompson. Guess what. He "made love to us, energetically" that night, too.

I'm with biscuit on the Wigan thing. They got the big decisions in those days (still do).

David "smug lover" Oxley and his acolytes at the RFL got what they wanted in those days. 2 VERY strong Humberside teams. And "woe be tide" anyone else. Refs (and their preferred/instructed by the RFL, teams) got away with murder, as there was precious little screened coverage of our game, so out and out cheating could be glossed over.

Say what you want about Sky, at least our game gets a lot more coverage now, so blatant bias can't be swept under the carpet.

As I've said many times on these boards re reffing standards today compared to the 80's, when posters say "oh no, it's Child this week".......
......YOU'VE NEVER HAD IT SO GOOD.

I pity to think what our sub 35 year-olds would think of Thompson/Kershaw/Lindop/Smith/Whitfield/Campbell.
There's a few more turd names for you to mull over, biscuit. Try not to throw things. I'm over it now. I hope you are, too

God this thread has wound me right up, will go home and kick the wife now!!!

Thank heavens, there would have be outrage if you had said the dog!