No that ref was Saballyes or summat like that. I’m sure Rascagneres reffed the Aussie test matches in 1982

John Holdsworth was a great and fair Referee and it was always a pleasure to watch him in charge of a game.

I dont mind Thaler, but Hicks is a pedant.

I always thought Steve Presley to be fair and unbiased. (cue Elvis cracks

)

Karl Kirkpatrick and Russell Smith for me (at least until the Terry O'Connor swan-dive-and-knock-on-over-the-line against Saints that he gave, after which Smith went to the screen for EVERY single try).

Worst HAD to be Alibert for me. I had the distinct displeasure of listening to Ref's comms at the games and every single Alibert game, he was being coached from the sidelines.
Just utter ineptitude.

I used to like John holdsworth especially when skerret was up against sonny Nichol
Remember the cc cup replay at Knowsley road in which kelvin and sonny started scrapping just after kickoff
Holdsworth went to skerret and yelled you are off and held up the wrong card.he had meant to use red but instead pulled out and held up a yellow so kelvin only got ten minutes And best about it was he had to go with it as it was live on bbc due to England football being abandoned on the same night
Was an enjoyable night with a good result against the rabble from Merseyside

yeah that was the trouble in Ireland wasnt it?, I remember just getting in from training at night and seeing the news but watching wigan so winner

I've been watching rugby since I was 8 (so 9icon_cool.gif and I can't remember a single ref I thought was good. The vast majority come over like arrogant self-important people, to be honest. Maybe Ian Smith was alright.

I've been watching since 1959 and I'm really hard pushed to name a consistently good ref. Now bear in mind, it's got to be one of the hardest jobs in the world, reffing a RL game . You've got to have your eyes everywhere. Also, bear in mind 'touch judges' have often been rather lacking in supporting these refs too.

All that being said. Even the likes of 'Sgt Major' Eric Clay, who was a pompous ref IMHO and who often couldn't keep up with play, but who is lauded as being a 'great ref' by the pundits was not very good. A character yes. A good ref no. Kirkpatrick was also a character.

One ref who does stand out for me, was that really biased Australian ref who GB complained about - was it Bill Harrigan IIRC ? Australia didn't need any help on the field, but Harrigan often made sure when he was around.

"Hollywood Bill"

Russell Smith bent over for the Aussies on more than one occasion , and ended up reffing , and living over there .

A lot of the uk refs seem to give the benefit of the doubt to NRL teams. It’s either sucking up to big brother or some ill judged effort to be deemed impartial

Whereas their refs are openly biased and don't care

Steve Presley
Stuart Cummings
Karl Kirkpatrick
Ian Smith
Steve Ganson

were my top 5

How anyone other than Saints fans could put Stuart Cummings in the top 5 is beyond me.

He was indescribably awful. Biased or just plain incompetent? Take your pick. It doesn't matter. The only ref I can remember whose arrogant poppinjay attitude to his own poor performances saw him get attacked on the field (not that I applaud that incident, but it shows how much annoyance he'd caused).

Some embarrassing comments on this thread. If you think every single match official you have ever seen is poor then I'd invite you to consider that either:
A - You don't fully understand the intricacies of the rules, or how the officials work together (and with the players) to enforce them.
OR
B - Your expectations are beyond what hundreds of men over decades of rugby games have tried their best to deliver, and therefore basically impossible.
I'd suggest for 99% of fans it's A. You don't understand, but somehow feel qualified to criticise anyway. I wonder why we struggle to attract match officials.

Well said and it is not only the Referees, but the whole administration of the game.

The country today is full of people who can only criticise others, when they could do no better themselves!

Unlike yourself?

"The reason it looks better and faster is because the Referee's in the NRL, ignore many of the things which our Referees blow up for and allow the game to flow!"

More U turns than Dominic Cummings

"Hollywood Bill" came after perhaps the most colourful and controversial Aus ref Greg Hartley known as "Hollywood Hartley", who was around in the 70's and early 80's. Greg ultimately became a leading league radio commentator teaming up with an ex Manly prop Peter Peters whose Greek origin led to the duo being named Hollywood and Zorba.

Those were before my time but my Aussie mate has plenty of stories about Greg Hartley keeping getting appointed to big games and making controversial decisions that helped Manly. At the time Manly were the cashed up team that everyone hated and thought had too much influence over the game.

The other controversial one was the ref they called The Grasshopper who reffed a number of Origin games and NSW fans thought he was against them.

Jack Gibson at Eels certainly did not get on with Hartley (see Aussie R.L . History on u tube)

I'd imagine there are actually quite a few people who could do a better job of administering British RL than the RFL have done over the years.

Did not do so bad when Uncle Mo was in charge.

The introduction of the Super League, Summer Rugby, not to mention the Sky Contract!

Some people have short memories or are to young to remember.

Have a search on YouTube for a documentary called "The Fibros and the The Silvertails"
Really good Documentary - Certainly touches on how the game in OZ (And the UK) was in the mid 70's and what the Aussies did to change it around and why.
And probably we were 10years behind in doing it

Barry Gomersal(aka Grasshopper) when asked about his SOS refereeing of 9 matches in which NSW won only 2 responded by saying that any ref could have 2 bad matches and when further asked about his reaction to NSW detractors responded....

"It's mind over matter- I don't mind and they don't matter".