You'll never get consistency simply because no two incidents are identical. Westwoods looked deliberate and malicious, and you don't honestly see that very often

Having already targetted Morley with an elbow to the ribs, it could be argued that there was more 'evidence' of Fakir deliberately going high on Morley than Westwood on Carlaw!

Five games for Westwood is one more than I thought it should be, but under the circumstances I don't think he can complain. One game for Fakir, who does have history too, is a pretty poor decision in my opinion.

So, what's the difference between a smash in the face by the arm and a smash in the face by the arm.

The only real difference i can see was that one was carried off on a stretcher, the other wasn't and one was met with histrionics by the commentating team whereas the other was only worthy of a "he didn't miss"

thing is though thel(can i call you that) catalans didn't get rough in the game, certainly not according to our head coach.

Agreed, There is no need for it.
I wish they would get sent off as well though.

Westwood nearly kills someone and gets to stay on,
one of the french players brushes a players shirt and gets 10 mins in the sin bin

yes, perfectly well reasoned and described there.





I say it again, anyone who thinks saints fans are big headed know it alls, we're all wrong.

I was speaking to a Saints fan the other day. He told me that the Christian Gilbart was a talentless no nothing who wasn't good enough to play music at children's parties. I disagreed strongly and said that this was complete rubbish but he was adam(ant).

Tbh I get fed up with the lack of consistency when issuing match bans. I think Westwood deserved punishment for sure but 5 matches was way too excessive. In the context of the Catalan game particularly. There was a period of 20 minutes that I felt the referee lost control of the game after a collection of dangerous and spoiling play (mainly by the Catalans but as Westwood proved we were not without guilt).

Although Westwood should not have done that high tackle I find it hard to swallow that he gets 5 matches and last year Mathers got nowhere near that for that dreadful tackle on King. Please don't try and tell me that tackle was not 'intentional' as I don't believe it.

It may have looked deliberate but i quote "looked" unless westwood pleaded guilty to it being deliberate, then in my eyes they should provide evidence sufficient enough to prove otherwise. But im not posting again on here cause your all trumped up little trumps, whom the players laugh at when they read your posts.

I understand the offence was the 15.1b offence of "When tackling or attempting to tackle makes contact with the head or neck of an opponent" the Grade D indicates it was "by Intentional – stiff arm tackle – no attempt to tackle legitimately – violent".

Ben pleaded guilty to this (deliberate = intentional), and the club have decided not to appeal. Justice has been served.

I'm glad the players laugh at us, I won't feel as bad now returning the compliment.

I wish I could muster up the energy/enthusiasm to laugh at them. The shake of a head and the odd look up to the sky is the best I can do at the moment.

This is another part that interests me. Surely, from the clubs point of view they should have gone in and pleaded not guilty to this charge and admitted guilt to the lesser charge, ie, the one that Fakir was given, a Grade C offence.

Surely he hasn't gone in, with representatives, and pleaded guilty to intentionally smacking the bloke in the face. If that's the case, then questions need to be asked about the players representatives.

Their strategy might have been to mitigate sentence by admitting the offence.

Well if he went in with Lowes, Lowes was probably leaning back on the two legs of his chair with feet on the table explaining how it's not about him and it's easy at the top.

Players don't take any notice of these boards..

But surely intent is very hard to prove and I see that's the only difference between the Grade C and D.

I agree but not sure if you can bargain with the RFL and offer to plead to a lesser offence that the one you have been charged (unlike criminal case defence and the CPS for example).

Anyway we should get the full notes here shortly. [urlhttp://www.therfl.co.uk/about/disciplinary_item.php?id=744[/url

Maybe they were given the nod to plead guilty and get five, plead not guilty and get six on a rejected appeal?

To be honest, he probably knew he was up for it having, less than a year ago, pleading guilty to 06/04/08 Law: 15.1(b) Detail: Reckless about outcome Grade:C

PS - James Lowes does respresent the player accoring to the notes.

Doubt it. He was charged as Grade D which carries the tariff of 3-5 match ban, he got the maximum they could give him for that offence.

You would have thought that pleading guilty results in a lesser punishment than pleading not guilty but then being found guilty (isn't that roughly how it works in the courts?). Perhaps their rational was to plead guilty and get less than the maximum (4 or maybe even 3 games) but their policy backfired.

3-5 is the normal punishment for this offence. If a players past record is bad, then the committee are guided to increase the ban length.

Wasnt the last person that happened to sonny nickel years ago,didnt he get something like 6 matches,appealed then ended up with 8..





didnt he use them up in A team games as well??

Good old RFL sreknaw