We'd probably be less down on Child if his decisions and actions (or lack of) did not seem to the fans to go predominantly in the other team's favour.



Remember (part-time) Kirkpatrick was considered total pants in his first season - yet look how good he ended up?

For as long as I can remember it has always seemed that the refs that turn out to be the best appear to be the worst in their first couple of seasons. Not sure why. Perhaps their bosses recognise potential and promote them a tad early. Or perhaps they just need to be thrown in at the deep end to gain experience.

I have been brilliant at everything I have ever done since birth. I don't see why everybody else shouldn't be.

Including, therefore, being brilliant at crapping your pants from a very early age?

as bad as child is lets not worry about the ref and go out there and take the game to saints!

Is of course the right answer.

Mr childs is not a bad ref at all..and is one of easiest to talk to along with mr silverwood, richard always gives tips wghich i take on boardand its improved my game no end.



Being a Tj is even harder cos if ref gives a decision winger/centre always ask you why he gave it..



Some players dont even know the basic rules..i sent a player off a couple of months ago for ref abuse when i gave a decision against him..afterwards his coach apologised and said i was bang right and player got confused with rules.



Reffing a game when some of players are refs are hardest..especially when they are a few levels above you like gareth evans a level 2 ref who plays for york lokomotif..but he came over after match and said i got everything bang on.

Are you james child in disguise

Well he didn't disappoint. Awful as ever and when he does actually make the right call leaves it until the last seconds and gets Saints a point.



Badly needs to be dropped from SL for a while. He is consistently really poor and is not up to being a prt time ref in a full time game. Act now Cummings and stop ticking quota boxes.

TBH the only real gripe I had with Child was his unwillingness to police the 10m at the PTB. He came up with some mistakes elsewhere but it was a bad day to be a ref with plenty of errors in those conditions and so plenty of opportunities to get a decision wrong.

He was very good in the conditions. You talk rubbish.

Well it now appears that Child mis-counted the tackles in one of our sets during the game. What's worse is that we actually scored a try from the 'extra' tackle we were given.

As far as I'm concerned this is the worst mistake a referee can make, there is no excuse for not being able to count to five, and as bad as the weather was it is still inexcusable.

about time we get benefit from a refereeing cockup rather than being on receiving end.

How did the rain affect his decision making? Is it easier to miss forward passes, late hits, ball strips, to not play advantage and generally measure 10m when you're wet?



Funniest thing he said all day was 'We don't want a penalty at the scrum'. Why on earth not James?

Assuming you mean Lynch's try, he signalled to wipe the tackle count after Saints touched the ball. He did miss the knock on by us at the time though.

Are the referees alloswed to look at the screen? When Wilkin clearly ripped the ball out then smirked as he had won the scrum, what is stopping Child from looking at the screen and changing his decision?

I don't think so. Though I would be all in favour of the VR having a quiet word in his ear. As I am sure all Bulls fans would be. =#FFFFFF<cough>Harris<cough>

Nope, not that one. It was Kearney's try. He signalled tackle 'three' twice in the build up!

hardly our problem if ref can't count though. you play to the whistle and assume the whistle blowers competent.

I don't think the VR would ever do that.

If they did they should be exported to the colonies.

All this talk about referees is making me feel sick.

Hasn't happened for at least 4 years

Well it's where he came from!

Funnily enough I thought I heard an Aussie accent (from the ref

) in one of the recent championship games on Sky, so maybe they've sent another in compensation, so to speak.

Dropped for this weekend> No spot in the middle for Mr Child.