A lot of anguish amongst the players about the ref's performance yesterday. I was sat next to David who was apoplectic about the penalty count. So why did we get caned by the referee? There is something about defending against a big side going forward who land on their fronts and get quick play the balls. But I think there is something more systemic than that. Can you imagine the outrage there would be during a game at Odsal if the ref gave a string of pens for nothing offences against the Bulls, killing momentum? No neither can I. The farcical 40/20 decision for example, from where I was I couldn't hear any reaction from the fans at all, nothing. Can you imagine what St Helens or Warrington fans would have said if that had happened to their side? There would have been blue murder. So here's the thing, I don't think the count would have been half as bad if the fans were on the ref's back from the outset.

This is nothing new. Brian McDermott complained regularly that Quins were given the fewest penalties in Super League, and often the most against. There has long been the view that London fans lack the rugby league culture on this. How many fans are genuinely passionate about the game as opposed to merely interested? I'm just asking the question!

I do believe there is a lack of collective passion where fans are together making a lot of noise. Where are the Loyal and Loud these days? Mostly stopped coming, unlikely to return as a lot of fans are from those days. Disloyal and Quiet? For the few of us who stayed for the 2 days, this was particularly noticeable at the Summer Bash. London was the only match not to get noisy, animated support. Even North Wales Crusaders from Championship 1 did much better!

So what can be done? I don't know. After 35 years will the culture ever change? Could there be fans initiatives? All pretty unlikely, so we will just have to continue to suffer horrendous penalty counts forever, probably in silence.

Ronnie I can assure you there was as much noise as is possible from the number of people about that 40/20 ruling? I agree the bias yesterday was like being back in Super League There are many things needed to build the Bronocos to success over the next 10 years (number 1 being to decide what we want and start towards it) and I can assure you the volume of crowd will follow!

I was apocalyptic and even the Bulls fans sat nearby couldn't explain why either.

I was sat pretty much where the ball bounced for the 40/20 that wasn't given (!) , I can assure you Ronnie that the London fans round me were apoplectic - and loud!!

Make as much noise as we like it would not have changed to tj decision.
Sorry guys but as for the penalties possibly chalk off 1 but that would still make it 13-5.
The simple fact yesterday was tackle technique, Bradford dominated the ruck which means they get the advantage at the ptb, we tried to slow it down and paid the price. The crowd noise may change that but only by encouraging the team, you are unlikely to change the refs way of doing stuff.
The fans initiative should be aimed at the players!

Every team we've played looks to slow down the ruck. Your coach and consultant are both conversant with what needs to happen and you are going to have to get some powerful and quick forwards in to be able to make progress. It will be a real eye opener if SL quality refs are in charge of the middle eights and I can see Championship clubs getting blown away unless they can match the pace at the ruck.

The reality is that every team we have played including Bradford have used a variety of means to slow the play the ball down. We arent any different, only in the eyes of the officials.

Neither side was dominant in the ruck, nor on the edges. One side scored 5 tries on the set after a penalty, the other 1 or 2 tries. Without the pens, the game would have been something like 6-6.

A key issue for me was Bradford stepping forward off the mark all through the game and delaying the PTB - both illegal and both designed to extract penalties. And it worked - the ref and Broncos got schooled.

I agree with Ronnie on this. Part of any team turning their home ground into a fortress is that the fans go some way towards intimidating the ref. That won't happen here, plus given the fact that referees will always shaft us on the penalty count effectively reduces any home advantage

Bradford often played quicker that was the problem for LB.

we have 600 fans. these loyal fans will make noise but it will be lost in a stadium that can host 8 times that number. Interesting that we made plans to leave the stoop because we were only filling 18% of the stadium on match day.......now we're in a stadium 1/3 the size and only filling 12% of it.....Progress

Colley boy sorry mate but I have not got a clue what game you were watching.
Look at the tackle technique, virtually every time we were tackled we ended up facing our own line and or on the back. Look at our tackle technique the Bradford players invariably ended up on there knees facing our line that means we are losing the ruck in both attack and defence, and that results in Penalties against.
Give over trying to blame the refs only people that give Penalties away are the players.

I was watching a game with perhaps 4 breaks. Neither team looked likely to score unless starting a set after a penalty. Completely contrary to you, Micky, I felt that we wrestled much better than Bradford who relied more on floppers. The difference, as usual, was that the oppo were more composed at 6, 7 and 9.

Here's a question: would you swap our 6, 7 and 9 for theirs or would you swap middle units? I'd take Gaskell et al. And the ref of course!

Yawn.....they won mainly because they were better than us, once we ran outa steam, which we have been doing ALL season against the better teams.

To be fair I don't think they were that much better than us - but they had a bit more savvy and played the ref like an old violin. As I have printed on a tshirt 'youth and skill are no match for age and treachery'!

My honest opinion on the game as a whole! Bradford played to there strengths, the ptb was much quicker and they dominated us in the ruck.
We lost direction on the park soon as Hendo came off..its hard to win a game without the ball, we gave it away 14 times and probably conceded 30 mtrs on every one of those 14 occasions.

It was the same last year, we never learnt to play the ref, commit an offence like holding down once can be seen as testing the ref, twice ok laziness 3-4-5 just plain stupid.

as soon as we learn that quick ptb gets results we will start improving, tackle technique to control the ruck in defence earns you the right to have that little extra time to set your defence.
And don't bloody argue decisions even if you think it's wrong, ref is never gonna change his mind because you are in his face, aka 40/20 suck it up and get on with it.

Couldn't disagree more with this post. God knows we're a long way from the finished article and Bradford are clearly, on their day, a better team than us. But this really wasn't their day - even after they'd been given countless ball on the bad of some decidedly dodgy refereeing decisions. When the penalties started coming they started scoring - often after we'd successfully held them out for more than one set. Given that the decisions came after such bad (let's call them bad, other words do spring to mind) calls I'm not sure what you're expecting from our team. Eventually, a side as good as Bradford are going to get through your defence. I therefore don't blame the players for conceding, even the softer tries, on the bad of bad refereeing calls. Yes, yes, you need to get on with it and try and keep them out if you can, but I think it's poor form to highlight our deficiencies on those occasions, and not acknowledge a far bigger factor of the lame-brain decision that immediately preceded it.

I actually thought we did well to stay in the game as long as we did, to not collapse immediately before half time also when I can't remember us having the ball at all! I was hopeful that the second half refereeing couldn't be as bad so we had a chance. But actually it was worse and THAT more than any other factor in the game is why we didn't give them a closer game. There are plenty of times where it's easy to hide behind the refereeing decisions as hiding a bad performance. For once this really isn't one of those times!! Wise up people, we did ok in the circumstances. It's only a game of course, but we don't have to look inward on this one. We were done, it wasn't right but I'm also not suggesting some malevolent conspiracy either. Hopefully it won't happen again, but if we have to apportion blame let's at least get it right this time.

Have to say that I agree with the view that we are a far better team with Hendo on the field. It's not that he produces anything special, it's just that he talks and harries his teammates. I am amazed that we don't have another player who can do this. We are lazy and without direction when he's off the field.

Bad decisions from the Ref that got worse, which game did you watch? The issue is LB could not handle the quick play the ball and were more often than not lazy in their tackle technique. Referees do not lose games only players.

Daft dad well said, at least you were watching same game as me.

Yes first time this year.

Good you made it down mate, you gonna see how we get on against Leigh or you had enough pain?

A little more respect for the ball and that could have been a different scoreline.

Such nonsense I'm not even going to get into it. But would love to know how many instances you can recall where a side has beaten a side above them in the league with a 3:1 penalty ratio against them

Just shows how poor the playing skills are within members of the team.