Tonight Payback Time

[Firestarter]

One serious question. Is leuluai playing?

When did we sign him? Cause I have not seen a thing from him this season. Passenger of the highest order.

Could be worse, we could still have Matty Smith.

its worse..... we replaced him with tommy

[Warrior20]

As for the Watts red card, I don't think he should have been sent off. I know there are all sorts of different interpretations that get thrown in every year but here's why I think it's harsh.

He's only just received the ball for the hit up, would have been looking at the ball and only looked up a split second before McIlorum charged in. There's no way he's had time to think about deliberately elbowing him in the face like some have suggested. If he does make contact with the elbow it's incidental, but it generally seems to be the forearm. The arm is barely above waist height and Mickey's tackling technique is terrible. Even if Watts arm was flat at his sides Mickey would still make contact with the forearm in the tackle and probably still comes out of it with a head injury. If he was carrying the ball in his left arm and made the same contact nobody would bat an eyelid. They'd all be commenting on Mickey's poor tackling technique.
A players non ball carrying arm has to be somewhere. It's not going to be tucked in by his side is it? Nobody runs like that. His arm has to be away from his body before contact and is always going to be raised slightly after catching the pass. The only way he could have avoided the contact is to raise his arm higher, but then he really would be raising his forearm!
The majority of carries from the props in that game will have seen the ball carrier go into contact with their arms raised higher than Watts in that split second before contact. He's unfortunate because every replay ends up being in slow motion - you shouldn't judge it off slow motion replays because it distorts the actual time he had to react to a player rushing in and makes it seem more of a conscious effort to move the arm rather than an instinctive reaction.

Every single reaction I've seen from current players, ex-players, former Wigan players who've played alongside Mickey, and the former official Richard Silverwood (he was probably the best we had) suggested the sending off was too harsh. Opinion is pretty one sided from those who have played the game at that level.

Watts arm was just below shoulder height, so it was a raised arm, he catches Mac flush in the face with his elbow. Whether he meant it or not is irrelevant, it was dangerous contact with the head, an accidental high tackle would have seen the same outcome.

[TrueBlueWarrior]

Gelling cost us another game....oh wait! FWIW I thought SOL was outstanding and FPN's 2nd half stint probably won us the game in the end!

How many times has Watts been sent off this season?

[BriH]

The analysis of the Watts sending off was an utter disgrace.

The referees simply can't win.
Hicks had already warned the captains three times about niggles and foul play. Connor had already been penalised for hitting MM in the throat. As for SKY, dreadful, no mention of what had gone on before.

Watts was sent off as much as for what he had done in the context of what had gone on before as for the elbow into MM's face.
If there was a game that needed two refs it was last night's prior to the sending off which settled matters down.

Agree.

Once the ref has made his decision in 'real time' that's it.
Analysis after the event is - in this case - down to the review panel.
All the 'post-event' analyis by the Sky 'experts' only undermines the ref's authority.

[5miler]

Gelling cost us another game....oh wait! FWIW I thought SOL was outstanding and FPN's 2nd half stint probably won us the game in the end!

How many times has Watts been sent off this season?

was thinking that myself. I'm sure I heard sky say it's now 3 times this season. Don't know what the others were for but it would appear that Watts possibly has some issues he needs to sort out otherwise he's going to be on the naughty step a lot.

[josie andrews]

Gelling cost us another game....oh wait! FWIW I thought SOL was outstanding and FPN's 2nd half stint probably won us the game in the end!

How many times has Watts been sent off this season?

He's had three red cards this season!

[Caboosegg]

Gelling cost us another game....oh wait! FWIW I thought SOL was outstanding and FPN's 2nd half stint probably won us the game in the end!

How many times has Watts been sent off this season?

despite a couple of errors remove gelling from last night and we would have lost (in my opinion) he made some.very good carries and the intercept try was brilliant. showed the rugby brain he doesnt own. if he played every game like that id be happy

[Firestarter]

Gelling cost us another game....oh wait! FWIW I thought SOL was outstanding and FPN's 2nd half stint probably won us the game in the end!

How many times has Watts been sent off this season?

despite a couple of errors remove gelling from last night and we would have lost (in my opinion) he made some.very good carries and the intercept try was brilliant. showed the rugby brain he doesnt own. if he played every game like that id be happy

unfortunately he doesnt play like that every game and one good game doesnt make him s good en

[Caboosegg]

Gelling cost us another game....oh wait! FWIW I thought SOL was outstanding and FPN's 2nd half stint probably won us the game in the end!

How many times has Watts been sent off this season?

despite a couple of errors remove gelling from last night and we would have lost (in my opinion) he made some.very good carries and the intercept try was brilliant. showed the rugby brain he doesnt own. if he played every game like that id be happy

unfortunately he doesnt play like that every game and one good game doesnt make him s good en

but at same time he doesn't only have the odd good game. he isnt perfect but nowhere near as bad as people make out and i personally wouldnt replace unless you could get a world class centre.

the offload to the hull player last night was cringeworthy though.

[TrueBlueWarrior]

Gelling cost us another game....oh wait! FWIW I thought SOL was outstanding and FPN's 2nd half stint probably won us the game in the end!

How many times has Watts been sent off this season?

He's had three red cards this season!

....but he didn't mean it!!