Saints were the least bad team on the night.

Cats were unlucky with injuries and the ref on the night, but at least they didnt get mullered like they did against us a couple of years ago.

Some would say unlucky, others would say Saints earned the right to be fresh through their performances over the course of the season, whilst Catalans earned the right to be shattered.

I don’t believe for one minute that there was any kind of orchestrated conspiracy in favour of Saints last night. No one would risk the scandal of getting someone to lick the ear of Silverwood or anyone else to purposely ease the way of Saints to the GF, no matter how much they would have liked to. I do think that as a game the 50-50s were more like 70-30s in favour of Saints, but I do believe that these were just straight forward bad decisions. Having said that, who but a psychiatrist would know whether that knowing that the mass of the game would sooner have Saints in the GF than the Cats wouldn’t subconsciously effect Silverwood’s and his helpers decisions, a psychological affliction I doubt will infect the minds of tonight’s officials. (Fingers crossed)

Don't have a problem with Saints winning, they've done well this year with significant players being out so them winning has no bearing whatsoever on me saying that last night the officiating was just a total embarrassment to everyone and if it carries on in that manner people will be turning away from the great sport of rugby league very quickly indeed. Most fans can take a loss on the chin if they have had a fair crack of the whip from the officials. If the players under perform that's one thing but having decisions go against you because of bad refereeing is something else altogether.
Never was the name of Specsavers on their shirts more ironic

It didn't affect the overall outcome (I don't think), but I had to turn it off at half-time.

The 2 biggest errors in the first half that may have affected the outcome though were glaring.

1. Saints carrying the ball out being missed. OK - MAYBE the Touch-Judge could have missed that, but it was fairly obvious.

2. The Catalans try that should have been referred to the VR and WOULD have been given if it had been.

However, my single biggest problem was with something that Cummings said about the aforementioned try:

"That's where the crowd comes in to play" (possibly not verbatim, but that was the basics).

Basically, he admitted that a strong away following would have seen the Cats try on the replay and caused an uproar, possibly causing the ref to refer it to the VR (which has happened before, this season).

How the hell can an ex senior official admit that the crowd can have such a large bearing on the outcome of the game?

He basically admitted that teams with smaller away followings are more likely to get screwed over, due to the referees being far more affected by the crowd than I had ever thought they would be.

How is this a shock? Have you never been to a game at Headingly? He just said what we all know...

I still disagree that the Bosc event was a try, on any other day it's a knock on and no one blinks an eyelid... The Makinson thing was in touch though.but, equally there were at least 2 forward passes in the build up to that, (iirc) so it's swings and round abouts - not that 2 wrongs make a right, just the ref was pretty awful for both teams...

I was only shocked at the way it was put.

Basically, he stated that if Catalans had brought a bigger crowd, they would probably have had a try referred that otherwise gets chalked off without consideration.

I think we all suspected that the crowd had *some* effect on referees, but for one to come out and put it so bluntly was was pretty shocking.

Is that because of silverwood's performance

It was an admission that crowds influence games. Yes we all knew it, but should be one of those things that's never really admitted.

Didn't have many issues with the reffing last night. It wasn't great but it rarely is and Saints would have won even with a ref dead set against them because Catalans were shattered.

Fair play to Saints. They finished top and whilst I don't think they're a great side they've given themselves a shot at a GF. In a final funny things happen and they have every chance of causing an upset next week regardless of who they play.