Leeds got away with murder in the first half

I thought Hohaia deliberately slapped the ball out rather than it being a tackle impact. He had every right to but if you play for it and it goes forward then surely it's a knock on, loose carry or not.

Of course you can knock on when not in possession of the ball, if you smack the ball out of an opponents grip towards their line then it's a knock on. We see this pretty much every game. In this case, Hohaia seemed to knock it towards the Sts line so it should have been play on.

I've never read something so completely moronic in my life.

No matter how secure a grip you have on the ball, it can always be knocked out. Hohaia goes in with the arm, swinging through the axis Sutcliffe is holding the ball in. This means a hit on the top of the ball will knock it clean out. The only way sutcliffe could have prevented it would be holding the ball in both hands, and if that's the standard we're going for then we're basically at Yawnion with ball stealing fully allowed.

The ball goes directly forward in front of Hohaia and behind Sutcliffe. Even if it's not a ball steal, it's a knock on in the tackle, and Leeds head and feed.

There is no way you can come to the decision you suggested without rewriting the rules of the game, and as far as I know it is not SilverXXXX prerogative to rewrite the rules on the hoof.

Silverwood was atrocious at judging strip/knock on. No consistency in it at all what in one tackle was a strip was a knock on in another. Really poor.

His judgement of what was played at from a kick was also different to anything i have seen. The LMS one was an absolute joke, LMS even gave himself up desperately trying to keep the ball in play.

I dont think he let either team 'get away with murder' or gave one half to one and one to the other, I just thought he was really really poor.

Does RL actually need a forward pass/knock on rule?
I think there are a lot of positives in allowing players to pass in any direction, in which case the knock on can no longer happen as it's just an unintentional forward pass, normally to yourself. You would still retain the offside rule as for kicks so you couldn't have NFL style quarterbacks launching the ball 50 metres down the field. Well you could but the winger/wide receiver would need to be damn quick to catch the ball from a starting position behind the passer. Some positives:

[listNo more controversies about whether a knock on went forward or not
Ditto for passes
No more requirement to look at the 'angle of the hands' for passes
Noi more arguments about strips/knock ons
Less interference at PTBs as less to gain for the defender
Consistency for VR decisions, everthing can be reviewed
When the referee doesn't know how the ball came out in the tackle he can wave play on rather than guess how to restart
More attacking options at the expense of having to secure the ball better
A more entertaining game, particuarly in difficult conditions
[/list:u

99.9% of knock ons are unintentional and no advantage is gained so why do we have to give the opposition free ball instead of making them work for it. Can you imagine in football if a free kick was awarded to the opposition when a player failed to trap the ball correctly or the keeper dropped a cross. Yet this is what we do when a fullback fails to catch a kick downfield cleanly when the nearest opposition player is 30 metres away, even if the ball clearly goes backwards to everybody except the referee.

Although I doubt this rule would ever be changed for full RL, perhaps it could be incorporated in a 9s style tournament similar to crickets 20/20.