This guy should have had a WAKEY shirt on today, he seriously was that far off side ! The ref never pulled him or spoke to him ! Even Hicks running the touch line was useless ! he spent most of the match off side to a fine art, in the 2nd half when we took a penalty goal it was ridiculas, the whole of the Salford side was told by the ref to get on the line but he was belligerent & refused to do it properly !
Yes we won but his spoiling tactics frustrated our play, the game has rules & is a spectator sport.

It’s not often I moan about offside as it’s a fine line but today there were some blatant offside defence.

Although the ref didnt make any meaningful mistakes I thought his general reffing was below par for super league. Too often these days the younger refs often lose the control of the game when it’s getting ‘tough’. I’m certainly not a ref basher as they have a difficult enough gig as it is.

When you’re as slow as Whelham, you need a head start.

I see, that must make it alright, or is that comment an excuse for him ? However, I agree about new refs looking control etc.

He made several meaningful mistakes. The biggest was falling for an outrageous swan dive holding on penalty milk with 20 to go that led to a Salford try, yet when Fifita was involved in something similar with 9 to go, he waved it away. There was a blatant high tackle on Hampshire with about 6 to go that was missed. And they played about the most offside game I have seen at Belle Vue this season. Mikalauskas had no control over that game at times. The worst issue was pulling the leg up in the tackle. I counted 5 times they looked like they were deliberately trying to injure the player with the ball, hyper-flexing and twisting the knee as they moved away from the tackle. I missed the one on Bill Tupou that will probably see him miss the Huddersfield game, so that's 6 times. Chessie was not happy with it at all from the Radio Leeds interview. I can take bad Ref decisions but opposition deliberately looking to injure, I am not happy with. Mikalauskas was useless today I thought

Correct, I suppose if you were a Salford fan you'd also feel hard done by but have to say some truly odd decision especially from Hicks on the line!

The thing that baffled me is the interpretation of interference in the tackle. There were a few instances yesterday when we got pinged for it and I swear that the tackle hadn't been completed yet.

Yes he wasn't good, but in all fairness we got a few our way at times.

However in my opinion the game is being ruined by the PTB and everyone is trying to milk penalties. Once milked the benefits can be huge and help change the game. Some clubs rely totally on this tactic in order to win. We need drastic rule changes that make it far easier to interpret and control. Plus greatly reducing the incentive for teams to try and constantly milk them.

The basic skills of rugby should be what wins games and not what you can do to constantly falsely milk possession and field position

It should be simple.
Once the ref has called "held", any additional contact of extra players coming in should be an instant penalty.
We should have the same 2 refs as they have in Aus but, there just aren't enough decent refs over here to organise that style.

I can live with some of the laying on but, the diving to ground or pretending that they have been shot is bloody awful and has NO place in a sport that has always been proud to be played hard.

There is no excuse for the Refs falling for it, they must surely analyse matchred afterwards so by now they should surely be very dubious about awarding such penalties yet it seems they deliberately fall for it every time.

The penalty against Pauli for a ball steal was laughable it was clearly offloaded

Indeed.
He saw Pauli coming at him and couldn't get rid of the ball quick enough.

When a player dives forward he moves off the mark but this is constantly ignored.


The other one I hate is the tactic of playing the ball against the body of the prone defender. OK sometimes they are slow to move but sometimes they cant move. They are not supermen and sometimes it is totally impossible to get out of the way in time.


The point is, sometimes the offence around PTB are intentional and sometimes accidental and harsh if awarded. I would start by altering the rules.


For instance when the PTB hits a prone defender then instead of a kick up field and 5 more tackles which is far too advantageous, I would just wipe of the tackle from the count.

Absolutely right PB. It seems the NRL are telling them to play on if it hits a prone player so at least some action from our lawmakers will filter through eventually.

My greatest concern is the deliberate penalties conceded within 10 yards of the line. it was used by Warrington last week to great effect to control play, frustrate our attack, destroy momentum and basically cheat and it's absolutely certain that it is heavily coached.

My solution - every infringement in the 10 yard area is met with a 1 minute sin binning where the player has to stand alongside the 4th official for a full minute before re-entering the field between the goal posts. Any delay in leaving the field results in a yellow card; any word from the player is a red card for dissent.


Let's see how much these Aussie coaches have in their locker when their coached cheating is driven from the game.

can we also introduce 10 press ups as well