Just read Bilko's match preview and noted the frightening ( but unsurprising) statistic about Bentham. Wigan have won only 7 and lost 14 of the 21 matches he has refereed.

When one considers Wigan's record in the past 10 years ( apart from 2006), ie they have won more matches than they have lost, then one must wonder why there is such a discrepancy.

The statistics with Ganson, who we often criticise, refereeing are very different and perhaps what one might expect from a team who win more than they lose: 47 wins and 22 defeats according to Bilko's statistics.

I don't want to increase our paranoia, but maybe questions do need to be asked about this discrepancy - I presume there would be statistics similar to Ganson for the other referees.

Well i dont know how to explain it but it stands out a mile

He's a Leigh supporter. Leigh supporters seem to dislike Wigan. I'm sure it affects his decisions.

Can these statistics not be put in front of Stuart cummings or someone at the RFL, to see if they care to comment ? Even if they dont care to comment, then at least they will have been made aware of them, and moreso, that someone else i.e. us, are aware of them.

So approxiametely with Ganson the win to loss ratio is 2:1 whilst with Bentham the loss to win ratio is 2:1.

Surely the figures relating to Ganson should similarly be put in front of the RFL?

You are not applying the ratio's in context to Wigans win/loss ratio though, which if applied, then Gansons in not out of kilt, yet Benthams is totally against the grain and cannot be explained.

Not if our overall win:loss ratio is also about 2:1, as that would show that Ganson was about the same as all the other refs, whereas Bentham was way off the overall average. Don't know the exact figures but I could easily believe that we've won twice as many as we've lost in the SL years.

No they shouldn't! The fact remains Wigan have consistently been one of the better teams in the past 10-15 years of SL, despite not winning much silverware. This is always shown by the Sky match statistics at the start of a game - I'm pretty certain Wigan have even a better win/loss record against Saints and Leeds in this period! You will thus see that Wigan's win/loss ratio is similar to Ganson's for all referees ( apart from Alibert where I think we've got a 100% win ratio!)

It is only with Bentham that there is the huge discrepancy.

Had a quick look thro the stats since Bentham's first game in SL and our win/loss ratio is 74/51, if you exclude Bentham's 7/14 the ratio us 67/37 when Bentham isn't refereeing. I'm not a Statistician but in a mathematical analysis Bentham's figures would be classed as an extraordinary variance form the expected.

Are IL and the Wigan club aware of this? And I'd love to know what Cummins and the RL would make of this extraordinary variance from the norm.

Bentham was on GMR last night. I listened in for a short while, while I was in the car, but no-one challenged this 'variable' either by text or by phone. Did anyone ring in ?

=#FF0000Admin Edit: *Personal Email Removed* - It does say in the bit you pasted that the email is "strictly confidential".

No team in SL history has the better of us on the Head-to-Head statistic

I sent an e-mail questioning his match turning decisions in the cup-tie at Leeds. As I expected it wasn't read out.

Absoulute disgrace. He quite clearly hates us and iv heard many a story were he has publicly admitted this in certain places.

I wish some people would look at this years games only leeds away have we deserved to win, the others we deserved to lose the game.

Not a clue what you're on about?

It was an admin edit. Should have pointed that out.

I believe that to be the one & one biased Gerry Kershaw IMO, now he was a bad ref, much worst than you see today

Maybe Bentham is considered the top ref in Super League and the games you have had him for have been against the higher placed sides, eg Leeds, Saints and Wire and you just haven't been good enough for the majority of these fixtures.

The supposedly lower ranking refs have therefore taken charge of fixtures against your Salfords, Tigers etc... where Wigan have prevailed more often.

Bradford and Quins. Definately the top teams.

We didn't deserve to win most of those games imo, but I also don't think it's a coincedence.

Except the stats against the top 5 this year are:

v Saints 1:1
v Warrington 1:1
v Leeds 2:1
v Hull 2:0

so in our favour 6:3, of which Bentham ref'd us twice

And one of those losses was Silverwood as ref not Bentham, and 2 of our 5 total loses this season have been against 11th & 14th (ref: P Bentham)

Last year

v Saints 0:1
v Hudds 0:2
v Leeds 1:1
v Hull KR 2:1

against us 4:5, of which Mr Bentham ref'd 1:1 for us.

He hasn't ref'd us for any more games against the 'top sides' this year than last, nor more than other refs, but his numbers stand out and our win:loss against 'top' sides has actually got a lot better.

Any other theories that don't stand up to the light of day?















=#FF0000Personally I don't think it's any sort of suspicious conspiracy or bias, but I am genuinely interested as to Cummings' take on it all given the immense unlikely-hood of Bentham's stats against us over time in the context of our win ratio. P.S can Phil choose some lottery numbers for me.

I said [imaybe[/i.



How far back does this twenty odd games go?

24th Feb 2006 was his first Wigan game when we beat Hudds 36-20.

All stats from Bilko's fabulous site.

They really do make strange reading, and a lot of them are against the 'non top sides'

More so against lower teams if you look into it.

For the record our current records which each official.........

Thierry Alibert - 7 Wins 0 Losses from 7 games - 100%
James Child - 4 Wins 0 Losses from 4 games - 100%
Ben Thaler - 15 Wins 2 Draws 4 Losses from 21 games - 78%
Ian Smith - 32 Wins 1 Draw 13 Losses from 45 games - 72.2%
Richard Silverwood - 27 Wins 12 Losses from 39 games - 69.2%
Steve Ganson - 47 Wins 4 Draws 22 Losses from 73 games - 67.1%
Phil Bentham - 7 Wins 14 Losses from 21 games - 33.3%

The average success from all that is 67.8% so Bentham is way, way, way below that.