Did the referees get the big calls from Round 25 correct?

Round 25 has proved to be a hugely significant one in the Super League season and as is often the case, there were a number of huge refereeing calls over the course of the past few days.

Super League referees do a brilliant job in testing circumstances, and it’s simply impossible for them to pick up on everything and get every decision right.

Here are the big calls they made this weekend – and why, on the whole, the majority of them were the right ones..

Should Zak Hardaker have had a try for Hull FC?

We start with one of three calls from Sunday’s Hull derby that caught our eye and may merit some attention. In the wider scheme of what went on in the second half with the ill tempers from both sides, this moment may have been forgotten about somewhat.

But it definitely looked like Zak Hardaker may have had even a slight case to contest that he was blocked off by Noah Booth as he came close to scoring in the latter stages of the first half of the Hull derby.

Hardaker fumbled the ball in the air as he collected an Aidan Sezer kick but there was perhaps an argument he was blocked by Booth in the act of attempting to pick it back up. Had it gone to the screen, it would have been very interesting.

Should Luke Thompson have been sin-binned?

We’ll probably know more about the answer to this on Monday morning when the Match Review Panel meet, but Thompson’s hit on former team-mate Jonny Lomax looked to have been close to the threshold for a sin-binning on Friday.

It was dangerous and it made contact with the head of Lomax, and there were a couple of people around the press area on Friday surprised it wasn’t more.

Was Elliot Minchella fortunate not to receive a red card?

The instant conclusion to jump to here is yes: but referee Liam Moore actually explained it very well and very clearly on Sunday, underlining why he’s one of the top officials in Super League.

There is categorically no doubt that Minchella’s hit on Lewis Martin was dangerous, and it made contact with the head. The reality is that Minchella was simply fortunate Martin slipped somewhat into the tackle, because it instigated the infamous mitigation factor we now often hear referees cite.

Had Martin not slipped and Minchella still made contact with his head, there would have been nowhere to hide and no other decision than a red card. But on this instance, yellow was correct: though Minchella will surely get a bumper disciplinary charge.

Should Castleford have had a try given against Wakefield?

It didn’t matter too much in the grand scheme of things because Castleford won the game, but there was a big video refereeing call with 20 minutes left in their game against Wakefield on Friday.

Chris Atkin broke free and passed right, and the ball appeared to come off a Wakefield defender before Atkin and Jeremiah Simbiken simultaneously grounded the ball. However, it was deemed that Simbiken spilled the ball prior to that. In this instance, it looked as though the on-field call of no try went against the Tigers.

Should Jack Ashworth have been shown a card?

There’s no doubting on this one, you would argue. It was an incident that Sky pundit Jon Wells described as ‘basically assault’ as Ashworth dropped an elbow into the face of Mikey Lewis.

We will likely discover on Monday just how bad it was when the Match Review Panel charge Ashworth for foul play.

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