Nope he was the 6th, only jumping up to 5th on Bentham's injury, and he was back in action by the time of the aforementioned Saints vs Wigan game of 2013 so he was way back down the list to 6th again.

Still continue to bury your head in the sand and pretend all is above board with his appointments.

ahh so now you have had spread in to a new season to back up your point? and only up until a certain point for some reason.

So if we deliberately define big games in a certain way, and we deliberately define the period of time we are looking at in a certain way, and we argue that we judge them on performance but don't promote him ahead of Alibert whose seniority consisted of 4 games in 2008, then...

My God...Perhaps your right, theres something definitely dodgy here.


Hang on, no, wait, there were 27 regular season games between the top 4, (12 normal ones, 3 magic Weekend) Child was 6th best apparently, Though Bentham missed half a year. So to find out the amount they should have refereed, if the referees were appointed at random we simply dived 27 by 5.75. Which gives us 4.7.
So if appointed at random, given YOUR definition of big game, given YOUR definition of experienced referees, and given YOUR expansion of the time frame from 2012 (the year YOU picked as highlighting his beneficial treatment) to include 2013 James Child should have refereed 4 or 5 big games.

You wanna hazard a guess at how many it was?

No he shouldn't because the top 2 refs, the ones who get the cup and playoff semis and finals get the biggest league games, not your pathetic scrambling shared maths effort.

Also Alibert had reffed England vs NZ internationals, WC games. the 2011 WCC, so vastly more experienced.

Try as desperately as you want, but simple question do you think the 5th most experienced ref should be appointed to games such as Wigan vs Saints & Leeds?

Considering you're always slagging the game, RFL, clubs off for not marketing, promoting the game as well as they should then surely not putting their top refs in charge of the marquee tv league games surely you should think the RFL should appoint the most experienced best refs to these fixtures???

As we have shown. They don't really.

Alibert was a neutral ref. One also publicly rejected as not of international standard.

Yes.

I think fans and anyone with a brain would think it ludicrous if only one or two referees were, for the most part, allowed to referee the big clubs.

I also think it pretty funny that your new line of argument is such a strong argument against your original complaint. That Child is refereeing Leeds v Hull this week. If we accept all your ridiculous premises, and all your ridiculous suppositions, then logic is in complete opposition of your complaint.

Thaler was officially "rotated" last weekend - so he has gone from biggest game of the week to Championship and this week is straight back into the biggest game of the week. It's hard to discern if the official "rotation" line makes more sense than him being dropped given he comes straight back in at the top.

Every ref who has gone onto red Wigan/Saints since has either reffed a playoff final/semi or go onto....apart from 5th choice Child.



Did he have much more experience of internationals and a WCC under his belt yes or no Mr Dodge the question?



No they wouldn't because the best refs always have gotten the biggest games and Wigan vs Saints & Leeds are as big as they come.....but hell must be rotation. It's one thing if the 5th choice referee got Wigan when they played Widnes or London or Salford for example, very different to appoint them when they play Leeds and Saints.

You know they're BS appointments and he shouldn't have gotten them considering his ranking on the referee's ladder at the time but you don't want to admit it because of possible questions it raises. No one with an ounce of common sense who follows the game can honestly say Child getting ALL 3 of those marquee games in a 12 month period is logical. 1 game, ol, 3 games is BS.

Has anyone checked to see the fixture lists for certain games? If there are a number of bigger games this may be why JC has refereed certain games?

Where is James Child from? I've noted that it seems more plausible that referees are likely to cover teams near to their own patch (Thaler: Wakey, Cas, Hull; Bentham: Warrington, Widnes, Leigh) so that the RFL aren't paying out loads for travel costs and extra expenses.

Has anyone measured how the other referees performed in subsequent weeks running up to those games? Is it a case that other referees may have been dropped to lower games and JC rewarded?

There are probably a huge number of other factors to consider or even throw out there.

I assume he's from Leeds (or at least somewhere near) as he's a quantity surveyor for Leeds Council according to my dad.

Another thread ruined by SmokeyTA: An SJW who misses the point more often than not and who loves to throw out lots of insults to try and make himself feel superior.

I see the goalposts have changed again, and are still wrong

Thierry Alibert never reffered a playoff final or semi.
Ian Smith refereed many Wigan/Saints games and never a play-off final or Semi

You didnt ask a question. But he didnt have 'much more experience of internationals and a WCC under his belt no. His experience on internationals were almost all 2nd tier internationals after his quality was publicly stated as not being good enough.


ALL 3? there were by your own measure there were 27. There is something here which is certainly BS. Im not sure it is what you think it is though.

Its always nice to see someone so eager to tell on themselves.

SJW

Ironically I would usually agree with you regarding Smokey ruining threads, but in this case the thread was ruined as soon as it was started.

Why? Because you don't agree with someone's view? Should point out this isn't a criticism or pointing the finger at Child because he isn't the one who makes the match appointments or denotes refs. it's pointing the finger at the RFL and those who control the referees. This site regularly has people pointing the finger at the RFL and accusing them of all sorts yet people are saying the definitely couldn't be guilty of positive/negative discrimination of an employee? The same RFL that is called corrupt and inept week in week out on here?

Claiming something is to do with someone's sexuality with flimsy circumstantial evidence only shows someone's existing prejudices.

Thinking people who you don't know personally are homophobic based on a single internet thread only shows someone's existing PC ways.

Do you think the RFL isn't in any way capable of positive/negative discrimination?

you say that like in some way its an insult

well he was bloody awful for both teams today. a cracking game which he did his best to spoil with some, frankly, bizarre, decisions

He totally lost control of the game and what game he watches sometimes I have no idea.

It didn't really matter in the context of the game but have you any idea what he binned Manu for late on?

a tip tackle someone side but I didn't have a great view. 20 odd pens, 3 sinbinnings yet no real niggle in the game. crackers

What do you mean by "tell on themselves" Smokey?

Maybe, maybe not. I don't personally think we're seeing positive discrimination when it comes to James Child but it wouldn't be a huge shock to me if stories came out backing up what the OP said. This could've been discussed without the OTT outrage from several posters and Smokey having to throw insults around left, right & centre, like he always does when he's trying to avoid questions or change the direction of a discussion.

Superted, genuine question, are you homophobic?

Absolutely not - a persons gender, race, sexuality, religion has no bearing on my thoughts towards them. I have absolutely no issue with James Child and the way in which he lives his life (other than being a pretty pedantic and hopeless ref). For what it's worth, if Child was black, I'd be asking the same question - some people will no doubt find that offensive and claim I'm also a racist - which would be real funny.

I've seen positive (and negative to be fair) discrimination first hand in my working life on numerous occasions - A quick example, recruiting for a role within the business where the majority of people doing the same job are white, straight males - whilst not given an explicit instruction, we were advised to prioritise applications from those who do not fit into that same demographic, 'its good
for diversity' - the innuendo was very much forget who's best for the job, let's get someone black, female, gay etc who might not be the best applicant, but who can do the job.

it happens, and IMO it's potentially at play here. I may well be wrong, but something doesn't seem right on why he seems to get the big games, despite ruining them more often than not, which is why I believe he is then not trusted with finals - give him the odd big game with a relatively low consequence if he/when he farks it up so we look inclusive, but keep him away from big games because he's useless.

I think we should be able to discuss subjects like this without claims of homophobia, racism etc for daring to raise the subject!

Thanks for answering the question so honestly. I dont agree with everything you said and im not convinced its true in this case but i do have personal experience with the rfl and positive discrimination that was blatant.

You happy to share your experience? Might add to the debate (for those who are actually interested in talking about the subject, rather than mud slinging).