Deano G wrote:
The biggest problem that we face going into the play-offs is that referees seem to be very lenient with Wigan's opposition. Whether this is merely a bad run of luck or something to do with the ridiculous bleating about Wigan's "tactics" coupled with the usual anti-Wigan bias in the RL establishment remains to be seen. At the moment though, it is worrying. Fortunately we were significantly better than Leeds in all areas on Friday and managed to win despite being much more harshly policed than Leeds on infringements. As we move into the playoffs and have to beat the likes of Stains and Wire then if this continues things are going to be difficult. William Hill have us at 6/5 to win the GF. I think those odds flatter us, particularly with the way we and our opponents seem to be being refereed at the moment.
I'm glad you say this. It shows I'm not the only paranoid one around here.
But, joking aside, while we fans only really tend to see it one way, there have been some stand-out examples of - shall we say - 'odd' refereeing, at our expense, this season. Last Friday was one. The Leeds game in the cup was another. And then there was the away Huddersfield fixture, in which the opposition coach had appeared to actually threaten violence against our players beforehand.
Note, I'm not complaining about Wigan incurring a load of penalties. That happens when you apply a strong, smothering defence. I'm talking about Wigan players being subjected to incidents of thuggery (which occurred in all these games), the culprits going unpunished, and then Wigan players being sinbinned for technicalities. There may have been other matches which I've now forgotten, but these three come quickest to mind.
I'm not sure what, if anything, we can actually do about this. Wigan's official policy seems to be to not complain - at least not in public. And this may be sensible. When you've got a controller of referees, who is apparently answerable to nobody, and who, during his own playing days, regularly showed poor judgement and was accused of having an anti-Wigan bias, I don't imagine it would take much to goad him into giving us an even harder time.
But you're right - it's definitely starting to look as if someone is out to stop us, and I don't how much longer the club will let that go on for without questioning it.