In one of IL's first fan forums he asked us if we as a club needed to be nicer. This was on the back of salary cap breaches and IL believed that we had to be squeaky clean in future to make us more well liked in the game, and the fans seemed to agree with this. 10 years later and we have generally been good, a couple of lapses with Wane's comments to bash them in Australia, which were pretty much hot air and not (unfortunately in my opinion) acted on in the Roosters game, along with the Flower incident which was generally seen to be well handled by the club, IL even saying that he wouldn't have wanted us to win the match in such circumstances. We have been a positive influence on the game generally over the last 10 years, continuing to produce more players than anyone else which shores up other teams in the game, along with going to Aus and London, while producing a generally young, British team rather then be a pension fund for over the hill Aussies.

And guess what, we are still the most hated club in the league despite despicable assaults on our players from the likes of Westwood and Ferres.

So maybe it is time for IL and his team to stand up for us and publically create about decisions like Clubb on Saturday, the extremely dubious semi final officiating and the Leeds try in the 2015 Grand Final. I am sick of the club saying that the best team won, guess what 14+6 from Tony's try = 20 points which would have given us a win on Saturday. Don't find many people criticising the Saints team from the noughties for being outplayed for 70 minutes and going on to win - instead labelling it "Never write off the Saints".

Also Wane needs to stand up and actually prove his tough man approach rather then use it as a soundbite, can you imagine the Leeds team with their hairy d pros or someone like Wilkin letting Sneyd run the game in a dinner suit on Saturday. As another poster mentioned Shaun Long was a master at this. We have some tough hombres in the team - MM, Bateman, Leluia, Shaun - one of them should have been instructed to sort Sneyd out, our game is too sanitised and we wouldn't be any more unpopular so what does that matter.

I'm sort of with you on this. Was saying to my brother before KO on Saturday all we had to do was pressurise Sneyd and then I'd be happy to back our pace against their power, but what did we do? We gave him literally 20m to place his kicks where he liked. In the NRL every kicker gets flattened, every time. Over here it's a different story and a much easier ride for half backs.

Did you watch the Hull v Leeds semi final?
The Clubb try should have been given, but in the build up to the Burgess try Marshalls foot touched the dead ball line and it should have been a drop out with us giving Hull the ball.

But there were 3 PTB's and a penalty after that happened so you can't say that Burgess try was a direct result of that

It doesn't matter how nice we are as a club. The collective "RL Family" will always hold a major chip on their shoulder regarding us, mostly through sheer jealousy and bitterness. I have tried to reason with some of them over the years (mainly the small town Yorkshire folk), complete waste of breath.

Surely that's a 20 metre restart for us as he gathered the ball with his foot on the line - therefore the ball went out from the kick.

Your right the ref was just inconsistent though. Petty I know but in the first half Burgess was obstucted every time going for the ball, we did it first time in the second half and penalty. It was a penalty but those before should have been also. The Houghton knock on when he gave our knock on. Little things but build up in a close game.

For me, Bentham has been pretty consistent for a number of years with regards to Wigan. Consistently bad.

They changed that rule this year, it's now a drop out, got to let the ball bounce out

seen it done this year though

Grimmy's right, the rule changed and for the better in my view.

In relation to the opening post, I don't think playing within the rules is being too nice. There would be uproar on here had someone taken Sneyd out late and got sent off. Truth is, he sat deep enough to give himself time to kick it well. He hid for most of the game and popped up on the last tackle to kick it. I don't think he took a tackle so we couldn't even rough him up there. Sometimes you just have to tip your hat to a player and I reckon this is one of those times. I just wish Sam had smashed him when he gave Sam a sly, cowardly dig after Sam lost the ball trying to score. That was the perfect opportunity but we missed it.

You may be thinking of kick offs, which are still a penalty if caught on the full with one foot out. Straddling the touchline also still works in the favour of the 'straddler'

Well, I have been thinking about this since Saturday and was about to post my thoughts which are remarkably similar to the supporters who began this post. Shaun Wane said Hull were the 'best' (I wish he would say better)team. I don't think they were. We out scored them by 4 tries to 3, two of our tries, by Gildart and Burgess were results of some brilliant passing while Hull tries were ordinary. I think the one in the right hand corner was a result of a forward pass.
Of course Wigan could have played better but so could Hull. Just because our kicking game wasn't good doesn't mean we deserved to lose!
It's the Maguire knock on all over again. We were cheated out of the challenge cup. Plain and simple.
Okay, one decision went against Hull IF our winger's foot was on the dead ball line, but a number of decisions went against Wigan. I'm not surprised when the ref is from Leigh.
IL should complain vehemently, not echo Wane's sentiments.

It was 3 trys each.

maybe pal

sour grapes get over it, best team won, should have been more, what I will say is your still a good team and your tackling is spot on, we closed you down and for the most part you did us , it was a cup final and both teams played like it was, but on this day we where better, on another day you might be, we might even play again in the grand final, by the way I thought Ellery handley was a true sportsman and a credit to rugby league

I have also been thinking about this since Saturday - but also since about 2010 -2011! Some would accuse me of paranoia but back then some statistics were produced about Wigan's win ratio with certain refs. No surprise but with most refs it was 70 - 80% - I think Alibert was over 90% though!
I believe it was Bilko who gave this quite startling information and he may be able to throw more light on this:
Wigan's win ratio with Bentham as referee was under 40% - an alarming statistical discrepancy when with all the others it was over 70%. A win ratio one would expect from one of the more successful teams who were Super League champions at the time and enjoying another successful season back then.
I know he was the ref when Wigan beat Huddersfield a month ago but that was Wigan's first and only win with him as ref this season. I am pretty certain he was also the ref when Wigan lost at home to St Helens, Warrington and Widnes last season. More paranoia?
And although Thaler was the on-field ref in the Grand Final against Leeds, as I can recall the 2 VRs (there were 2 back then) were a certain Mr Bentham and Mr Child....!! Or was Child the touch judge that day? It was they who judged that McGuire didn't knock on. I actually think Thaler was unsighted - these things do happen and one cannot expect an on-field ref to spot everything, but there was absolutely no excuse for the knock on not to be given by the VR. The ball bounced off his leg after he dropped it but it was not a deliberate kick, hence a knock on according to the rules of RL.
I believe 99 out of 100 fans/sane impartial human beings who understand rugby would have judged McGuire to have knocked on. Similarly, I believe over 90% would have judged that the ball was reefed from Clubb's hand and awarded a try. The whole BBC commentary team believed so as did the Hull coach.
I do not blame Bentham for not awarding the try - you cannot expect an on field ref to spot everything, but there is no excuse for Child not to see the reef. One camera angle definitely proved this - hence the unanimity amongst the BBC experts and Radford and seemingly everyone else - apart from Hull fans, who were understandably peeved by the disallowed try for obstruction - that for me was verging more on a 50/50 call) and Wigan haters.
Momentum is crucial in rugby league and Bentham has the unfortunate habit of making bad calls against Wigan (the 2 knock ons) just after half time. Even Jonathan Davies called these! These were just as crucial in Wigan losing as it took the juice out of them!, giving Hull more possession and leading to their only try of the half. By the way, was the final pass to the winger forward? Look at his body angle. It was certainly more forward than the disallowed Tom Davies try after 5 minutes in the semi-final! Paranoia??
One can expect some 50/50 decisions to go with your team and some against you. Were these 50/50?
The McGuire knock on and Clubb reef examples though were 99/1 or 90/10 at the most. When have Wigan been the beneficiaries of such incomprehensible (and incorrect) decisions by a VR? Particularly in a crucial game such as a final. I can think of only 1 - when Manfredi was awarded a try by Hicks in a Cup game (against Cas?) a year or two ago - but that was in the last few minutes when Wigan already had a big lead.
The disallowing of the Burgess try by VR Thaler in the semi-final flew in the face of the "rules" by which VRs are supposed to work. That is why an increasing number of Wigan fans are angry. One hears about "rub of the green" - I am so looking forward to Wigan having a decision by the VR go in their favour when it is patently the wrong decision. I want to hear what the Leeds, saints or Leeds fans will then think!
Paranoia? Is their some deep-seated reason why VRs give a decision that 99% of fans would disagree with? Is it because quite a lot of this generation of refs grew up in the 80s and 90s - when as young fans of other clubs (Leigh, Warrington, St Helens, Yorkshire teams such as Leeds and Hull) they grew up sick of the sight of Wigan winning the Cup and the League year after year....?!
Wigan haters?? Paranoia??!!
Enough of the paranoia - some rational and reasoned argument now:
Hull played the better rugby most of the game and in the eyes of many deserved their win. Wigan players made 2 crucial mistakes though that probably cost them the game in the final analysis. Farrell's failure to play the ball properly (an unforgivable mistake) led to Hull's first try and then Powell's kicking out on the full in the 41st minute (a lack of skill) resulted in the start of Hull dominating possession in the first 15 minutes of the second half and were just as crucial as the howlers from Child and Bentham in all this.

Yes

bentham is the only ref who doesn't allow you to cheat all game so no surprise you don't win as many with him in charge.

The only thing which saved you from a more convincing defeat on saturday was your excellent goal line defence. I hop you don't make top 4 as you will be tough to beat if you're in the play offs

McGuire having a try disallowed st your place in 2015 for obstruction and Tierney scoring away against Warrington last year to deny them the LLS (for a week at least) spring straight to mind as dubious ones Wigan have got from the VR......but I'm sure these will be clear correct decisions according to some.

Hull played far better rugby for an hour of that match - definitely worthy winners.

This 14 + 6 logic from the OP is nonsense. The whole game plays out differently if the Clubb try is given - maybe in our favour but maybe not. Who's to say Hull wouldn't have responded better than we would have at that stage of the game?

Very frustrating though when such blatantly incorrect decisions are made (particularly by the video ref) as the fans will never know what [iwould[/i have happened.

That's true, I agree that the McGuire knock on in the GF should've been a no try but that would leave us 2 points behind and after we got in front with 17/18 mins left we kinda went to control field position rather than score. With 60 secs left we drilled the ball into touch from 10m out rather than try to score.

Also wrt VR decisions a lot of its coming down to this on field decision nonsense which I think has made the use of the VR much worst. Most of the incidents described would've been different had the on field call been different. Much prefer them to revert to the old way of just leaving it to the VR alone.

Who said anything about taking him out late? Just make sure he knows that after every kick he's going to be (legally) put on his backside, NRL style.

The McGuire try in the Wigan home game should have been allowed but it was a mid-season league game and thus not crucial. I was referring to blatantly incorrect decisions in finals. The Tierney try was also only in a league game, admittedly more important, but it didn't prevent Warrington winning the LLS the following week.

Well whilst Wigan fans may disagree I think most thought that Liam Farrell should've been sin binned and an 8 point try for Leeds in that GF for a clear late slide onto McGuire as he scored his 2nd try made all the more dangerous by the drop offs on the OT pitch. He was ridiculously late and very lucky to escape punishment.