There is no moral equivalence here. Either Ah Van was wrong or he wasn't. What Smith and Tomkins did later (which is undoubtedly a negative) does not make one iota of difference as to whether Ah Van's was. We can debate that seperately, and we are.

Everyone agrees it was a foul, undoubtedly so, and some are even saying a yellow card although considering it was the first offence I think that would have been harsh. You see these challenges all the time, they never result in a red. We've been punished above what usually happens.

There is no ambiguity in the offences we saw later. Smith kicked a player running away from him out of play, on purpose, for no intent other than he lost his temper and wanted to injure. Tomkins, perhaps mistakenly trying to douse a situation caused by the violence of his team mate, grappled a completely innocent player to the floor when he was unawares. I think that's a lesser offence but not an innocent one. There's no debate to be had there, it's pure violence. With Ah Van's intent is everything, and a lot are agreeing there was no intent to cause harm. Misjudged tackle, foul.

And let's be clear. If he hadn't been sent off, people wouldn't be quite as agitated by the shoddy, shoddy discipline showed by Wigan on a few occasions yesterday.

Chris Dalton sums this up perfectly. Send his post to the RFL as official report!

Who said there was?


Again, who said anything to the contrary? You're arguing against points nobody has made.


Did you click the wrong quote button?

Nope. I did not.



Back to you.

Thanks for the congratulations but........

Ah Van, you said it yourself, accidental/clumsy. Not malicious. 10 mins at best.

Farrell, who I used to admire but has turned into an utter grub hit Mellor late a number of times. Pre meditated to put one of out playmakers off/out of the/his game, elbowed in the tackle and hit out at players as he was running past them

Scuffle broke out in the middle when O'Carroll, fed up of his halfback being hit late took matters into his own hands as the Spineless Child didn't have the cojones to do anything about it earlier

The Smith/Tomkins one has been done already. Petulant and peevish. Both red!

Wigan were poor both in attitude and execution. Wane seems to incite rather than coach. I suspect that Wigan will struggle (by their standards) this season and Wane may well be on his way.

Widnes did well to turn the game (a better side than Wigan circa 2015 would have kicked on.

As to the incidents .... Ah Van was clumsy rather than malicious. He desrved a yellow card and a warning to behave himself.

Farrell apperas to be just a dumb trier sho is doing what the 'coach' wants.

Smith should have been sent off - no excuse for kicking (it wasn't a trip).

Tomkins should have just been told to 'wind his neck in' - although to be fair, if he tackled like that all the time it would be an improvement.

On a different topic - it is going to take time for the new rules to be bedded in - the Saints v Cats 1st half looked like an episode of Emergency Ward 10 and must have been the longest half in the history of yhe game !!!

Wire fan here so most definitely a neutral.

My main gripe with Child was his inconsistencies, i can live with an inept ref if it's equal but i found myself shouting at the injustice of his allowance of the Wigan laying on tactics and the penalising of Widnes in half the time he allowed Wigan.

I really couldn't care less in this fixture about the result but whoever won or lost i wanted it to be a blood and thunder entertaining contest and most of all a fair one...it wasn't(a fair one that is).

Ah Van sending off, going off past seasons i'd say harsh but i don't know what's been said behind Red Halls doors in the off season so I'm going to assume this is a new directive.
Unintentional definitely but intention isn't the prerequisite to a sending off, personally a yellow would have sufficed for me.

Smith, intent and foul play surely must have no other outcome than a red, it's violent conduct even by rugby full contact standards.

Tomkins, i think wasn't trying to tackle him to the floor but the player(?) Wasn't ready for the contact and fell back with Joel on top of him, although i don't think he was peace keeping, Tomkins has always been a hothead and a bit of sh*th**s*.

Draw was a fair result UNDER THE CIRCUMSTANCES, although I'm not sure it was.

12 v 14 for me, Child dreadful.

Find myself almost completely agreeing with a Wire fan which must be a first. Bad refereeing is a given, not much we can do about it but blatant bias is another thing altogether and believe me, this fella's got plenty of previous where Widnes are concerned. To add insult to injury, we had the other clown Robert Hicks running the line who seems to have reported Smith for something he said, but couldn't see the blatant kick aimed at a retreating player. For anybody who knows anything about the game, these 2 are an embarrasment and for good measure, you can put Ben Thaler into that category as well.