Maybe if the Wire players could keep their composure in, let's be honest, a fairly low-pressure environment, it might actually be their year one year.

That’s great but what about the fans.

Strange that the referee is getting the blame. Because of the production you could clearly hear the referee talking to the players all through the game, it's hardly his fault that they took no notice is it?

He sent two players to the sin bin early on, which should have been a warning to the players to calm down. McIlorum can feel very hard done by in that instance, he was merely trying to pull Hill away from the Catalan player.

And why any of this should result in "fans" attacking each other is completely beyond me.Just to add since Catalan came into Superleague, I've been to every game over there except two, anf have seen very little trouble, and certainly nothing like the scale of that yesterday, and there's been some "debatable" referring performances!!

After catching the last few mins last night, then reading a lot of the comments about James Child, I imagined he must have had a real horror show. Having just watched the game in its entirety, I found a lot of the criticism to be utter b0ll0cks. Catalans are never the least grubby of teams but what they served up last night was fairly standard in terms of low level thuggery, certainly nothing to induce Warrington's disciplinary collapse. The majority of the game was actually quite watchable with Child keeping it flowing despite a large amount of gobbing off by the usual suspects.

Anyone who thinks the ref is to blame for fans fighting needs to watch another sport.
A quid will get you a ton there was beer involved......too much beer.
I hope they hand out lifetime bans to all concerned

Agreed,and anyone who thinks otherwise must be a Wire fan.

Anyone who defends the violence or deflects blame for it is an ignorant thug.

I've watched the video replays of the fans fighting and for the life of me, can't see the referee anywhere? What I did see was a number of blokes dressed directly from Sports Direct trying to climb into the boxes at the back of the stand and another group repelling them.
Disgusting behaviour with no place in our sport.

Referee lets things go, crowd complain he's lost control. Referee blows a few penalties and produces a couple of cards, crowd complain he's lost control.James Child did ok. There's players on both sides need to 'have a word' with themselves.

I lost quite a lot of respect for Catalan in that game, the tactics they employed were a disgrace and against the spirit of the game.

They were very "grubby" tactics and the referee should maybe have stepped in earlier and had a word, but I am amazed as to how some Wire fans are blaming a bad ref on the violence off the park. As a London fan, we've had plenty of games where the ref gave us nothing, but I've never seen a punch thrown at a London game

Simple answer - ban the sale of alcohol before and during the game. Yes it's a financial hit to all clubs but the bottle throwing and fighting need to stop.

This isn't funny any more. The people with low intelligence that don't know their own limits have now gone too far. If a total ban needs to happen till the end of the season then so be it.

So...a handful of idiots act like idiots and you punish everyone?
I've never seen a punch thrown at a London Broncos home game and see no reason to penalise visitors to the wedding venue because a couple of idiots decide to go all Anglo Saxon.
In this day and age, I reckon it'l be easy enough to identify them and ban then for life with n need for a sledgehammer to crack the nut.

This is an utterly disgraceful post, you’ve shown your true colours here. Grown men who can’t handle their ale felt the need to try and attack Catalans fans yet that is somehow James Child’s fault? Warrington really have let the sport down and posts like this don’t help.

Hats off Sir!

It's nothing new though they were at it in their last match against us, with the rat the worst offender, however Watto put a simple plan together, don't get involved with their "gameplan" play around them and blow them away "again" !! worked to perfection.

Bravo to the RFL if they back and Childs . He did nothing wrong and forget about the bullcrud that occurred in the zoo cage , on the pitch the real ambassadors of our game let us down big time taking the sport back 40years. It was just unacceptable after being warned by Mr Childs to behave just moments before they then behave in such a manner that would on any high street end in a possible custodial sentence. It was violence and the thuggish behaviour IMHO was way worse than any overgrown drunken louts

On another point James Childs showed great restrain I think not to issue at least 6/7 red cards but these guys don't take things personally.

This is a popular misconception. You don't need alcohol to have fun/relax.

This is exactly he case.
As a proud wire fan, i was really upset and gutted to see our fans trying to get into the box. I wasn't there, so i can only go off what i hear from friends who were there and off social media etc.
But regardless of what actually happened and caused it - the footage that was beamed around the world is of our fans climbing into a place where they shouldn't be. It looked terrible, and it upsets me because that reflects badly on the sport, Warrington as a club and our fanbase, who are [iususally[/i widely praised for their support.

I've no doubt that the RFL & Super League will be on the club's case to make an example of anyone they can identify. Especially as the club, the RFL & Super League all released statements about the trouble.
All in all, it's damaged reputations all around and i think it will take time to repair, if it's even possible.

As a WT fan of many years standing, we've had our own issues with James Child - but I can safely say that even when I've felt an extreme sense of injustice at his decisions, I've never attacked an opposition supporter, or thrown a chair, bottle or pint glass at anyone.

Anyone blaming the referee for the thuggish behaviour of players or supporters, is either being deliberately dishonest, or is an idiot.

Alcohol is undoubtedly a factor, and perhaps this has been an accident waiting to happen because of the holiday effect of going there. Fans spend all day in the pub pre-game, in the heat, and usually people enjoy themselves, but alcohol shortens the trigger. Add in a heated game, frustration, and provocative actions by home fans, and you get what we saw, disgraceful scenes.

Perhaps the clubs need to stop people entering the ground if people seem affected by alcohol. If fans know they can't get in trollied, perhaps they won't go in trollied. When Wakefield played London in the first game of the season, some of the fans behaved pretty badly, with some seats damaged, but you could tell from many that they must have started drinking on the bus or train as soon as it set off. The sober ones weren't smashing seats or being aggressive.

There seem to be two entirely separate issues here - 1) the appalling behaviour of a minority of fans at the game, and 2) the issue of the tactics of the Catalan Dragons and whether the referee acted appropriately in disciplining them.

The first has nothing to do with the referee or the players, and needs to be dealt with by the respective clubs, the RFL, and possibly the police if any crimes have been committed. The second seems to be an issue for the SL disciplinary to take up in the usual way - if the referee has missed any serious misdemeanours then I expect to see the culprits punished with bans and fines.

There some very good posts only seeing to blame all except officials which is the normal default on these occasions.
Ultimately that position works on most occasions thus good behaviour generally holds the sports position.
However, even all other spectator sports have had their moments with injustices causing incitement, that position can be argued as no defence for that sort of behaviour, but in truth, we are talking human beings in a passionate cauldron, still not an excuse but a factual cause & effect. Football has long recognized incitement, cause & effect.
Child's has a history of only ruling on occurances, he does not use experience to judge early unnecessary behaviour, this he has a history of looking control & rising frustration ! Therefore the rugby football league have demoted him again which has happened before. Both clubs coaches have spoken out about him & his stance during the match ! I am no referee basher, but this man constantly makes wrong reads & pressure builds amongst the players which spills onto the both sets of supporters, behaviour good, indifferent & bad breeds the same behaviour to others, laughter, happens the same & spreads to others, this being a human thing - Right of wrong !
Hence, the well known thing, behaviour breeds behaviour.

[url=https://www.totalrl.com/james-child-relieved-of-super-league-refereeing-duties-this-week/Not Defended - Not Continued - Not Protected[/url

Where in my post above did I say anything other than in my opinion it was wrong to blanket ban an entire fan-base based on the actions of a few?

BTW, Despite both your holier than though and insulting insinuation regarding the need for alcohol, I am well aware that you don't need alcohol to have fun or relax, but that's not what I suggested......I would however point to your "carpet bombing approach" to stop a few idiots to being anything but a "simple answer"...unless the emphasis on the word simple was meant as "not quite the full shilling".