a veritable mine of information mon ami and a comedian with it !

have you ever considered a career on the stage ?

I once asked Billy Thompson what made him decide to become a rugby league referee and the answer he gave was he used to go and watch his local team Huddersfield & after watching half a dozen or so games he said to himself do you know I've half a mind to become a referee.

Don't agree with the Butterfield / Griffiths debate. For me its simple, the better full back is playing for the club.
Its not as if Tommy has been snapped up by another club is it

Sorry Wanderer, it was late!

At least we saw that Tommy chap catch the ball, tackle a player and go past a man.

I m still waiting for the current fullback to do any of these!

I must be watching a different game

Checked with the timekeeper before answering that bit, but the game was as always 80 minutes as timed by the timekeepers from both clubs following the stoppages and restarts from the ref.

Don't let the clock on the scoreboard fool you, that is hardly ever right and is controlled by different people. I've said numerous times they shouldn't do the clock if they can't guarantee it is right every time as more than once it has been misleading and could even be responsible for a couple of final results (tend to remember a couple of times where teams, both us and opposition, have kicked on the first or second tackle for example believing there was only seconds left). I'd turn the clock off; because at the moment the success rate of timing the match is less than 1 in 10.

Can you tell this is a particular bugbear of mine???

re Butterfield/Griffiths

For me Butterfield is a far superior defensive full back, he plays like he understands the role better and his positional play is better than Tommy's ever was. The biggest difference between Griffiths and Butterfield going forward is the way Tommy jinked about and made breaks for himself, I would however suggest that Butterfield is more likely to make breaks for others so needs to be supported in the tackle.

All in all I'd go with Butterfield, I would however have been tempted to retain Griffiths in the squad.

(IMO of course)

We've had this discussion before, I know the clock is not right, but as you say it looks bad.
The whole idea is that like sky clocks or TV clocks the fans can give it the old 5-4-3-2-1 chant knowing full well it's accurate timing that they are seeing.
If it beyond the realms of technology to have someone stop and start the thing accurately, then it's next to useless and as you say an hindrance at the end of games.
Oh to be in the 21st century.

Then we agree, got confused cause I was responding to where you said "80+ (yes plus) minutes" when it actually wasn't plus anything. I'm assumnig the technology is fine, it is just the person who stops and starts it who is the problem, I know they are also doing other things so may miss some stoppages; in which case turn it off.


On a related note, crowds counting down 10-9-8-7 etc is one of the worst things about live Super League games (IMO), people can never even get that right and ZERO is usually shouted with about three seconds left

We do agree. I know it was 80 minutes, I meant 80+ by the clock.
As for the countdown, that is usually chanted by the winning supporters who want the game to end and end up rushing the timing.

Now given that a football game lasts 90 minutes and a RL game lasts 80 minutes (minimum figures) this would suggest that the clock can be programmed to count down from anytime doesn't it? Can it be done to seconds? After 80 minutes can the stoppage time be posted and counted down? Apart from somebody moaning about input time losses and extra stoppage time in stoppage time.

Or failing that, posting there will be, say, 2 minutes stoppage time at 80 minutes on the scoreboard, or even announce it over the public address.

The point being that in a tight game when there has been a fair bit of stoppage and it matters, why is it a state secret how long is left?
Why can't it be announced? Supporters can't be arsed to do their own timing, the timekeeper is doing it, so why don't we get some indication? Too much fiddling about, I suppose?