He's either obstructing play or he isn't.
Whether it is intentional or not will make things even worse as the ref will never get that right (for one set of supporters or the other).

There are already too many penalties given by the referee because, in his opinion.......

Get out of the way would be my advice.

You can say it till you're blue in the face - watch the Sky RL highlights - Hulls own only shows one of the pens for some reason.

Hull did it twice, Wakey did it once, Saints did it vs Leeds - it's boring and needs cutting out.

You need your eye testing, firstly the Hull highlights show exactly the same thing as the Sky Sports website

1st Penalty, Houghton does not throw the ball at anyone, he knocks on as the player is in his way.

2nd Penalty, Clear high shot.

3rd Penalty, player is in the way, Houghton throws the ball at the player.

So only once does Houghton throw the ball at the player, the first penalty, is one that you see every week for the last few seasons, player made no attempt to move away from the ball.

Glad you confirmed that because I was thinking the same.

And the Huby incident he keeps mentioning - I haven't spotted that one either in the highlights.

Will just have to agree to disagree, 1st & 3rd are milked - agree 2nd pen is a clear high shot.

If we don't clamp down on it, then we are just opening the door for players tackling round the legs to have ball thrown at them as they can't get away as fast as dummy half can pick up ball and launch it at them.

So its milking that you are not happy about, then you will be complaining every week, it has been happening for years, and every clubs does it.

The throwing the deliberately at a player is different and I agree it needs looking at, as it happened TWICE yesterday, one for each team.

Yes! Thats the whole point of what I'm saying! Milking a penalty off a player who is technically but not deliberately offside because he cant get away before the PTB.

What did you think I was irritated about?

Wasting your time, as it has been happening for years, players from every clubs do it, not sure why it has been brought up now, bet at least 8 of the penalties at the weekend were milked by players, Tom Briscoe was a master at it.

And looking at the video, I am not sure what else Houghton could have done for the first one, as he couldn't even pick up the ball as Arona (I think, no 16) made no attempt to clear the ruck, clear penalty.

If Arona moves he would have either go toward Houghton and possibly trip him, or he rolls into the ball. As it was he laid there doing his best not to interfere - not a penalty for me.

I know players dive and hold on to players tackling them to make it look like they're being held down but the passing into a player is just more blatant and looks stupid.

Anyway, i'm tired of talking about it now but enjoyed the game as a whole - not much free flowing rugby but the armwrestle and forward battle between 2 packs giving 100% was good entertainment!