When it happens to a player way back on the other side of the field I've rarely seen a ref stop the game. Although it's interesting that the law says...

[i"Treatment to an injured player, by not more than one attendant, may be permitted while play proceeds if, in the opinion of the Referee, such treatment is not likely to interfere with play."[/i

what happens if the player needs treatment by more than one attendant, which was the case in this instance. To me that suggests the game should be stopped.

yeah exactly what my point was

The Referee should endeavour to reduce stoppage to a minimum. Injured players should be removed from the playing field to receive attention as quickly as possible, taking into account the gravity and nature of the injury

hence a serious injury requiring a player needing to be removed from the field for treatment should be stopped ASAP the only way he can get off the field is when the game is stopped

yeah exactly what my point was

The Referee should endeavour to reduce stoppage to a minimum. Injured players should be removed from the playing field to receive attention as quickly as possible, taking into account the gravity and nature of the injury

hence a serious injury requiring a player needing to be removed from the field for treatment should be stopped ASAP the only way he can get off the field is when the game is stopped

Can anyone Wigan fan come on here and say the best team did not win? No doubt about it as far as I'm concerned. Widnes were fired up, put some big hits in and attacked well. Best team won. All the issues are about the poor team selection. It's true a VR ref would have looked at some of the tries today but ultimately, its not the reason we lost.
A team packed with inexperience against a highly motivated Widnes team that took advantage resulted in the Widnes win. Fair play to 'em.

I'd say so, too. But there's nothing in the official law book that states play should otherwise be stopped in any particular circumstance other than the player being put at risk of further injury by being close to the action. So technically, though it's annoying when it happens (see my quoted example of a Wire player down injured against London in Brentford), there's nothing in the rules that states the referee [ihas[/i to stop the game for treatment to an injured player in backplay. It's entirely a referee's discretion thing, with his only directive being to reduce the length of stoppages to a minimum.

This Is the bit I don't like... On another day a different ref may very well have stopped play in that situation... and thing's would have been very different. a stretcher had been called on and there was around 4 or 5 people treating Goulding. However I'm not going to blame that one incident for our loss.. we were beaten by the better team, But I do think there needs to be some definitive rule one way or the other because I honestly don't think some referee's are capable of using their "discretion" in the right way...

Although like someone else has said elsewhere... It wasn't Hicks fault that all the Wigan players decided to stay on the other side of the field and not cover where Goulding would have been. leaving the biggest overlap known to man.

Of course, there's no point complaining about it as it's just one of those things that can go against you during games. It was a turning point when they scored but Wigan should have put the game to bed by then.

That doesn't imply that the clock should be stopped and play suspended. And nor should it. You see plenty of players assisted from the field while play continues, it happens sometimes and depends greatly on where the player happened to be injured in relation to the location of active play, grow up and live with it.



Complete nonsense. Define "serious injury", there have been season ending ligament injuries occur that I've seen with my own eyes where the player gets assisted from the field by two physios while play continues. If you mean "serious injury" as "this guy needs a stretcher", then fair enough. But there is nothing in the rules to state that play has to be suspended, so, your original statement that I challenged, is, of course, testicles

If you have a gripe with anything, and it would be a valid one, then it is with that particular section of the rule book being outdated and in need of revising to properly ensure the health & welfare of the players.

As far as the refs' decision to play on is concerned however, he applied the rules correctly.

I'm not disagreeing with that Robbo, I do think we play on far too often when players go down injured - but I draw the line at inventing new rules and stating them as being fact, they are on a downloadable pdf on the RFL website. For me, if you don't like it, then channel your frustration in to challenging the actual rules, not crying because the ref only followed what they currently are.



That'd probably be a defensive naivety that comes from a high proportion of inexperienced players, if you were short on that side then the defence should have communicated and restructured itself accordingly.

Why thankyou - so magnanimous!

any injury is serious but the laws of the game limit who may or may not enter the field of play and for a stretcher to be used the game has to be stopped which is what at the time was needed as the player hadnt moved for over 60 seconds so for that player to be removed from the field of play the game needed stopping.

Now i know all rules are open to interpretation and by my interpretation of the rules the ref needed to stop the game. Was it the reason we lost no we were outplayed but player welfare should be number 1 priority

Paddy flynn was in your 20 meter zone within 15 seconds of that player going down
Or did u not see that class run
By wich time widnes where on the attack,and you want the game to stop and be pulled back 60 meters
Where there was no 1 exept the injured player get a grip

Yup. As far as the rules stand, nothing untoward happened. I will happily agree with you that the rules are testicles and need changing, or worst case scenario clarifying. For example, there is no outlined procedure for what the referee should do if a player needs to be stretchered from the field (should he wait for a 'natural' break in play, scum, scored, turnover, etc - or should he be informed by the 4th official to halt play immediately? personally, I'd say the latter)