I thoroughly enjoyed that, it wasn't until the Smith drop-goal that I thought one team would win it.

Looking at the scoreline people would think the defence was poor, but some of it was brutal.

Both teams were really up for it tonight, but Wigan just deserved it.

Things I've gleaned from tonight, Matty Smith's goal kicking has improved, Tomkins & Solomona ain't B.F.F's & Milner throws his arms up in faux outrage more than any player in S.L.

Only saw the last 30 mins but Wigan were disallowed a try that should've stood and should've had an 8 point try for the challenge with the knees on Charnley.

Whilst Cas may feel hard done to with some of the other decisions they got as much go their way too in my opinion.

The Cas try that followed that saw a Wigan player do the exact same thing, so that should have been an 8 point try each.

https://youtu.be/ma0927FGshA He's going to get fined for it but he's 100% spot on about Thaler.

https://youtu.be/ma0927FGshA He's going to get fined for it but he's 100% spot on about Thaler.

I guess he probably won't be playing next week.

Wouldn't say he's 100% spot on but it's rediculous that he'll get fined for speaking his mind.

It's almost uncanny, isn't it? All of a sudden, his kicks are finding the grass by the corner flag instead of the bread-basket of the full-back. Our kicking game overall was pretty damned good tonight.

Outstanding performance from Thaler, and for once the VR worked as it should too. As a result, very enjoyable game to watch.

People bemoan the poor standard of Superleague, and that wasn't greatest game I've ever seen, but I still found it a much more exciting watch the the vast majority of NRL games.

It's not ridiculous. It's to stop post match conferences being b|tch-feats about the ref.

Powell was suggesting that Thaler should be sacked as a referee and was denigrating his ability as a referee with repeated references that Thaler "has been dropped a couple of times". When he hasn't.

God only knows why he was dropped after trying to get that walking, talking Monty Python sketch of a French VR to actually look at the video in Catalans. Yet Tricky Dicky Silverwood gets a major televised game the week after a humongous cockup in the Cup. I didn't notice Powell complaining when a terrible decision went in Cas favour.

Unfortunately it seems as if Powell got rather worked up like the Cas crowd around him instead of actually looking at what's going on. He admitted the sin binning was correct and he said that was a crucial part of the game. Wigan had a try wrongly disallowed and an 8 point try not given and Cas could easily have had a try chalked off for obstruction.

Weak defence and not enough composure in attack along with crucial injuries to a small squad is what cost Cas, not the referee.

Absolutely saints fan wanting wigan to win

Yep spot on. Whilst I can understand their anger post match especially on occasions when refs make really blatant mistakes....if you didn't fine coaches for criticising the refs then it would be open season and nearly every post match interview from the losing coach would be criticising the ref.



Yeah again agree. It's obvious Cas have come into the game with an issue with Thaler and straight away that clouds your judgment on every decision he makes. Most teams have that one ref they always seems to have beef with. At the moment at Leeds they can't seem to focus on the game when James Child is the referee and seem to be in a running battle with him.

Also on the 8 point try I agree. But don't think refs will give those unless the try scorer is hurt by the slide. Charnley wasn't tonight and neither was McGuire in the GF. Ratchford stayed down when he copped one off Farrell and it was punished. Which is wrong btw as it should be judged on the offence and not the damage done.

I thought Wigan's discipline was actually very good. Not often I think that, the absences of SOL, MM and Liam Farrell must help in that regard. Thaler got most things right.

I also think that Wigan's pack was the better of the two. I know they're much-maligned but they made ground at a steady rate of knots last night.

Didn't really have an issue with Thaler's performance last night, he got most things right. Webster was wrong about the offside as the cameras proved and regardless shouldn't have approached the referee in that manor.

Powell should and probably will be fined. We don't want it turning in to open season on the referee like football. It's something that's creeping in to the game, and needs stamping on.

I agree. I thought Thaler was spot on in most decisions and definitely in tth way he spoke to the players.
A lot of winging from Cas tonight.

Best team won even a saints fan can't argue with that, they did a good job on whinging Castleford. Powell accusing the ref of losing his cool when it was his own players who couldn't handle what Wigan threw at them.

I wonder what Powell would've said if some of the 50/50s that went Wigans way went Cas'. Thaler let Cas get away with stuff as much as he did Wigan. I hope the RFL stick to their guns (for once), fine Powell, and stick Thaler on for Cas's next game. As bad as Widnes whinging about Joe Cobb.

Bit strange this, i usually find cas fans fairly sporting, apart from last year when there was a couple of dubious VR decisions went our way, but last night they seemed to decide very early on that Thaler was against them and got on his back almost right away.
Strange because apart from the offside decision at HT and the Bateman incident i couldn't see what he did to upset them.
But as Gronk's posts on here suggest, cas fans have a problem with him or he is perceived to have a problem with them and that possibly clouded their judgement?
I thought he had a good game and stamped his authority well, unlike some modern day officials.

Quite an entertaining game last night. Few errors from Thaler, but thought he was generally spot on. Wigan got in their faces and Cas indiscipline cost them the 2 points imo.

Didn't think Thaler was great but didn't feel he was as bad as Powell thought. I'm not a cas fan but the part that would have wound me up was the Bateman incident I thought he spoke to gale like a cock as gale was being reasonable enough and asking when he could speak to him. And at the end of that the man who started it all in Bateman he has a laugh and a joke with and even winked at him. If I was a cas fan it would have wound me up.

Entertaining stuff - intense, nip and tuck and a bit spiteful.

Cas seemed to have an issue with Thaler from the outset and did a lot of whingeing and hand-flapping, which isn't like them; but I guess if you go into a game with a preconceived idea that the ref is biased, it's possible to find injustice in virtually every call that goes against you. I thought Gale could have found himself in bother in the first half too, when he blatantly put his hands on Thaler.

Anyhow - well done Wigan; although can someone *please* tell Tomkins to stop with the transparent attempts to milk a penalty; he now seems to have escalated his technique to include trapping with his legs as well as his arms - it's embarrassing.

Sorry for not having read through the previous 18 pages but, the game swung on the HT hooter.
Probably would be a penalty 9 games out of 10 and Cas were a little unfortunate with that but, their discipline was poor all game.
Wigan were certainly guilty of slowing down the ptb in the first half, which is probably why the Cas players and fans were getting upset. The third man in the tackle was taking an age to clear the ruck.

The no try at the end was a close call, just imagine if that had been to decide the game.

Wow!

I'm astounded at the number of well reasoned, balanced and fair comments in favour of Wigan on here.

Has some sort of reverse transforming filter been put onto thread ?

The offside at half time was deemed ok by Cummings because Gildart touched the ball behind where Manfredi knocked on, I'm not au fait with the exact rules so don't know the exact details but if that's the case then fair play to Thaler for seeing it if thats what occured.
The second gripe seems to be Bateman, and I thought that the penalty was given to Wigan for holding down, Bateman reacted with a slap on the head or as Castleford described it on their twitter feed as 'dropping an elbow', Dorn saw this and rushed in which then became a pile on. I think in the commentary it was mentioned that RL is not a sport where we reverse penalties so my interpretation was Wigan got the penalty and perhaps Thaler never saw the slap or whatever it was. Am sure the disciplinary will deal with it if anything is untoward with that.