I know a lot of people don't like him but for me he was the only half decent ref. at least he was always consistent that is all you can sometimes ask for. Still stoping on in a coaching capacity so maybe he has got another job lined up

Once teams adjusted to his quick whistle blowing early in games, games that he officiated were generally the best sort of games as it would be a quick game with little messing about at the PTB.

Great referee, the last who realised that you could still be an official and have a good rapport with players. Will miss him on the field, but sure he will do well in his new role. All the best to him!

Shame, good ref who kept proper control, although being in charge of them should hopefully imporve standards. Cummins was an awful ref and awful refs boss.

Mods,

can threads be merged?

my favourite out of the lot by a mile...never afraid of making a decision,a character that will be missed

An awful referee..... often just completely made up his own rules, guessed at decisions, missed so much of what was going on in front of him, was an unbelievably arrogant man, only Ben Thaler is worse.

I'll be glad when he's blown up for his last wrong decision.

Shame for the game, Ganson was the best ref definitely.

Easily the best referee in SL for quite some time. The average standard of SL refereeing just plummeted!

I can't quite believe the love-in here. He is a very arrogant character with 'little man' syndrome who always thought he was the most important person on the field and cravved attention.

Shows the dearth of refereeing talent around that he is now top of that particular tree.

Best ref for miles, shame he has retired.

Yes he was the pantomime villain and invariably you would come away from one of his games discussing one of his decisions but he laid down the law, kept the teams apart and didn't allow much messing about at the PTB.

All we have now is that useless dippo Silverwood you cannot police the PTB, cannot measure 10m and is generally useless. More often than not there is an incident in all his games because the players get so frustrated with his pathetic performance

I am hoping Ganno gets rid of him and teaches the rest what is required

totally agree..wish it was silverspud that was hanging up his whistle,,be one hell of a party in this house when that day comes

Whats the problem with Silverwood....?
he has refereed two of our winning challenge cup semi finals.. plus he's refereed two of our last winning Challenge cup finals. He's hardly Billy Thonmpson.....

I remember Ganson almost gifting Pat Richards a try in the Wigan Semi in 2009 when he blew the whistle and everyone stopped except Pat Richards who carried on the act of try scoring. seemingly completely oblivious to the fact he had already blown up Ganson went to the video ref, fortunately bridge had done enough to put richards in touch before Stopping in Reaction to Gansons whistle. it was a joke decision which completely summed Ganson up.

What infuriates me about Silverwood is his inability to police the PTB which invariably leads to a messy game and a build up of frustration which often leads to an incident. I am not saying the Ganson was perfect and the fact that Silverwood has officiated some of our big wins is completely irrelevant

We play better under Ganson because we seem to get a quick ptb, Silverwood and Child being the worst because they allow an eternity on the floor.

do you not remember simon grix leaving the field in a match against st`s years ago when leon pryce stuck the elbow in grix face causing him to leave the field and go to the hospital for emergency treatment on his mouth,thus missing the next 3 or 4 games..the countless times hes lent to his beloved saints when playing us by pinging us for off side,countless saints forward passes going un punished..and if you watched the bottom of the table clash today when he pinged ah van for a knock on (which clearly was`nt) the mans inept

They are all bobbins, just some than others.

Many years back, on the way to an away game me and my mates bumped into a group of refs at the services. Resplendent in my Wires kit (think it was the mild and bitter one) I zig-zagged over to them in a post hair-of-the-dog manner, totally failing to negotiate safe passage through the tables and chairs, and asked them what the plural for a referee was. When they replied they didn't know (although having noted my glazed expression and wires kit, they probably feared the worse) I announced "A ba**ard of referees".

Twas my finest hour. Not exactly Eric Morecambe I grant you, but I enjoyed it. I'm sure it was a sheer coincidence that the ref gave us nowt that later that afternoon.