It's irrelevant, they should be able to do their jobs without having to worry about having things thrown at them. Yes boo them and call them all sorts like happens every week at every single game (presumably because no referee in the history of Super League has ever had a good game) but nothing justifies throwing things at them.

We are at the point where that many officials have walked away from the game that some kids games are being called off due to no ref, and many top level amateur games have no touch judges. Incidents like this will contribute to that, and put people off becoming new officials. Maybe if people treated them with respect, we would have more officials to choose from and would be able to select ones who meet your standards. Why don't you have a crack at officiating yourself given your in depth knowledge of how they should act and what decisions they should give? I'll pay for your course and kit myself. There is an online one on 23/08/21.

Keep ignoring the cause of the issue and it won't get better. You just don't want to acknowledge any involvement in it.

You talk about giving them respect, but they do nothing to warrant it. Why respect Hicks when he acts the way he does?

Thanks for your offer, but I'm not that egotistical to think I can tell pro rugby players that they've done wrong. It's pathetic that a guy like Hicks or Child's think they can and also have the superior attitude that they do. They are up there with the very worse politicians imo.

The cause of whatever officials you see on the pitch is that we have no one better to put out there. Why don't we have anyone better to put out there? Because many people who would be great officials don't want to deal with abuse from players and fans. Given that you appear sympathetic to referee abuse, and we have now established you wouldn't be brave enough take up the whistle yourself, I think you should acknowledge your involvement in it.

Are the refs any better or worse than they’ve ever been? It’ll never be perfect, in the same way the players aren’t perfect. There are certain rules that need tweaking but as for the actual standard of the refs, some are good, some not so good and one or two need to work on their manner on the field but we’ve been saying that for as long as I’ve watched the game.

Ultimately I think we’re talking about refs more at the moment because of how poor we are. We didn’t have this level of debate in the Maguire/Wane days but they took ownership for their teams performances, unlike Lam on Wednesday night, who decided to hide behind a decision made when we were losing anyway.

If the ref makes more mistakes than your team you are entitled to feel aggrieved (not to behave like hooligans). I challenge you to find a game where that is the case. Wednesday was definitely not the case.

I've said it before that the current refs are no worse than the refs when i started watching in the early 80s. are they really any worse than kevin allatt, john mean or colin whitfied?

i think the majority on here agree, that irrelevant of how poor a ref is during a game(s) they dont warrant stuff throwing at them. I've hurled lots of abuse at them in the past along with opposition teams, but wouldnt even think about throwing bottles, phones, coins etc at them.

quite simple, find the idiot(s) and ban them from all games

Completely agree with you

Fred Lindop, Billy Thompson and you think that today’s ref’s are no worse

its a pity we cant do something along the lines of the barmy army.

i've been to a couple of test matches at OT, and was chatting to some of the lads there. Obviously they go to get tanked up and have a good day. The way one of them described the army was that they are basically self policing and the stewards allow them to sort themselves out inhouse (so to speak), and if anyone steps out of line they are dealt with by the barmy army and wont travel with them again. The stewards can concentrate on other matters

Today's refs are scrutinised with every word recorded, slow motion super zoom and any error can be shared to millions via social media. The refs back in the day could get away with a lot more.

I believe ex Swinton player Josh Barlow is taking up reffing which is good to see.

Like Grimmy said though , there are far too many young referees getting slated/abused/harassed by morons on a Sunday morning . They can only take so much before they leave the game . I’ve seen 14 year olds reffing their first games and getting abuse from the sidelines . That is tantamount to child abuse and is killing our sport . Grown adults swearing and abusing children is totally unacceptable. These are probably some the same idiots chucking stuff on to the pitch

Refs don’t always get it right ,and I have had first hand experience with Grimmy , but I don’t shout and scream at him . The players will always make more mistakes than the officials . If somebody can prove me wrong I’ll donate my house to charity

It could also be said. at that the Referees of years past did not get help from elsewhere like you have stated and had to make prompt decisions of their own.

As far as am I am concerned, there is not a Referee today who can compete with John Holdsworth who was not only a good Referee making his own decisions, but also fair to all teams.