I would just like to congratulate Mr Alibert on another superb refereeing performance at Perpignan - I can't recall any contentious decisions,the game flowed and he kept up with play in a thoroughly entertaining match.He has to be the fittest ref currently in SL ? Just watching his 'warm-up' routine was impressive !
I spoke with him after the game and he admitted his first season was tough what with the pace of SL and the language barrier not to mention he interpretation of the rules etc but he fels he has now settled in to the SL system and is feeling confident everytime he officiates.
Well done again Thierry !

Best ref in SL. Anyone that says otherwise is clearly basing their opinions on the fact that he is French.

And he looks a bit funny, don't forget that.

Like all refs , and players , he has good games and bad ones , but even when he has a bad one , it'll be miles better than most fans good ones

Well I do think he'd do better without the onions,beret and stripey jersey , and what the he'll is he doing on the pitch on a bike ?

not that you're making a sweeping generalisation of about thirty million french males of course ?

I though he was a woman

Don't be so precious. If Starbug had meant to make a sweeping generalisation about the French he'd have added cowardly, garlic-y, frogs legs & snail eating, dirty, unwashed, adulterous, cheese-eating surrender monkey's. And probably added some kind of 'Allo 'Allo quote to top it off.

That's why I only said it ' whonce '

he is a strange looking man (I think !) up close,preammturely bald and big sticky out ears and really skinny - doesn't have much going for him really ?

probably drives a 1997 Fiat Panda as well...

turning into a good ref tho' !

why 'cowardly' BigRob ?

and why 'surrender monkeys' ,BigRob ?

please explain

He still needs to remember to stop the clock when the balls out of play. Otherwise, he's improving.

did ok with that last night funnily enough

will be interesting to see how he progresses this season

the one thing you can't fault is his fitness levels

Having originally seen him in the Championship--where at best he was average--I still see no reason to change my opinion of him--at best average. .

watched him ref a LER match (Limoux v FCL if I recall) in january and he was appalling - lost control of the game completely !!! maybe the step down from SL affected his interpretation of the rules at the lower grade ?
still can't figure it out !

Define Average!!!!!

And unfortunatly that makes him the best out of a bad lot somedays.

Quote ="Leaguefan"Define Average!!!!!'" You could have googled it yourself. dictionary.reference.com/browse/average HTH

Quote ="Leaguefan"Define Average!!!!!'" You could have googled it yourself. dictionary.reference.com/browse/average HTH

Best ref going these days.
Never something that RL fans will agree with though.

agreed but it's difficult to define a 'good ref' when you are trying to be objective - rl fans are a fickle bunch and one bad decision can make a good ref look rubbish - I think it is and always has been a question of consistency and for me Mr Alibert is consistent so far this season.Can't ask for more than that IMO

I honestly think that's why everyone thinks he's hopeless, he looks silly, but he's still the best ref by far. He's the only ref in SL that isn't the centre of attention all the time and lets the players play the game.

Given the treatment I saw dished out to him when refereeing a 2nd division game in France, he was probably keeping one eye on the game and one eye on a safe route to the nearest getaway car. Brave men, the refs in France.

I don't think he's a particually good ref in terms of implementing the letter of the laws of RL. However, he does let the game flow more than Child to leans more to the letter of the law.

If teams play to Thierry's interpretations of the laws then they can get away with holding down, offsides and the odd bit of dirty play more than others. But the game flows.

<pedant mathematician mode>To be "average", either all refs are the same, or there are approximately half of them better than he is and half worse. Assuming refs abilities are normally distributed.</pedant mathematician mode>

Seriously, refs do get better. Reffing part time in the Championship is entirely different to being full time in Super League. It's vital that we have a top quality ref who isn't Aussie (have they actually got any) or British and Thierry is getting into that bracket.