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Liam Watts appealed severity of last night's sentence. Tonight's Independent Operational Rules Tribunal reduced to one game and £300 fine.


so the club appealed, good but still shouldnt have been banned

Watts ban now down to 1 game on appeal

By we I mean the club and they are usually fairly quiet on things like this.

I would like them to be more vocal and canvass other clubs on publicizing a vote of no confidence in the Rfl and the disciplinary committee.

The problem is that those who perhaps have it in their hands to do something about it , ie , the die hard RL fans and club owners , know that the constant parlous state of our game , caused by the administrators , is so bad that any real action , even just negative publicity created , would potentially destroy the game we love or at least put it even further behind the NRL , the RFU and lots of other pro sports. The press would love it.
How do we improve the disciplinary process , the refereeing standards , the TV Rights negotiations etc? Getting rid of what we have is only half of the problem. Where are the new administrators going to come from , the new competent referees and the more consistent disciplinary panel members? The most disappointing thing is the fact that those currently in those positions are smugly unaware of what everyone else thinks and/or don't care.

Pleased that the ban has been reduced but this is still an appalling decision. I looked at the judgement on the Amor sending off at Easter compared with this one. The Committee seemed to be trying to find excuses not to ban Amor - who had his arm raised even though the initial contact was with the ball - whereas they put the onus on Watts to get avoid contact with a player who was being propelled towards him. In the Amor case they even seem to acknowledge that front row forwards are in the thick of the action and are likely to have disciplinary problems but no such leeway is given to Watts. Appalling. Incompetent. Certainly lacking in objectivity. And probably biased.

The revised ban is still an appalling farce. But the 'independent' review panel was never going to fully overturn the decision of the first panel.

Its abysmal and blatant bias at all levels of the disciplinary. Been the same for years but now they aren't even trying to hide it. The only hope to get something done would be all the clubs getting together as one and demanding changes. But I doubt that will happen.

I'm just wondering how many times we have had a player up in front the disciplinary that Hallas has been on the panel as seems just about every time he sits on it.

it looks like Watts has copped a ban because of his 4 game ban at the start which IMO was severe and Gayle took no further part in the game. Anybody would think that the panel deem RL players superior humans and they are able to stop in a nano second and avoid a player dipping suddenly when committed to a tackle.
Unless they bring out a rule that says once a defending player has made contact with an attacking player they can not off load then how do they expect defending players to help affect a tackle? That is unfortunately the nature of the sport and these incidents happen in every single match.

As has been pointed out the similarity to Amor's & Roberts tackles to Watts and the different outcomes you have to askthe question of the RFL Disciplinary Panel.

Also as someone else pointed out re Ben Flower he had his ban reduced even with a shocking record because he hadn't been brought up before the panel for a similar incident. It was shocking tackle and how they reduced it it beyond me same as the SO'L one. Funny both play for Wigan must be a coincidence. Watts has hardly what can be called a poor record yet still cops another ban for something that should have been a penalty at most.

The RFL as has been said by another poster just carry on finding ways to make a pigs ear and set new lows for the way they manage this sport.

Can't see Wigan joining that particular motion lol it'd be like signing their own death warrant

Am I missing something about hallas ( genuine question ) . I know he made his name at the dobbins but I remember him playing very well in our championship winning side. He used to play well against k.r as well from what I remember so just wondering what's happened regarding constant remarks about being on the panel again

Am I missing something about hallas ( genuine question ) . I know he made his name at the dobbins but I remember him playing very well in our championship winning side. He used to play well against k.r as well from what I remember so just wondering what's happened regarding constant remarks about being on the panel again