The citing of the weekend

Hartley : cited
Clark : not cited (yet)

And I'm no lover of Hartley.

Clark has been sighted independantly has he not?

No news of Clark's citing yet, but my God he has to get cited.

I thought that he had been cited to be honest. If he gets away without a citing for that then its a sad state of affairs and i hope that his club pro-actively suspend him. No way is that not intentional in my eyes.

I voted for A N Other - just to destroy my personal interest in two games I had a passionate interest in.

I have to say as a Saints supporter this is quite disappointing. Saints are a terrific family-type club. So much inclusion, involvement, and interest in the community and most especially kids. This apparent behaviour is so opposite to the club ethos.

To be fair, Hartley is not the most engaging fellow in or after a match. But I have seen him with kids and he was patient, caring, and simply terrific. Especially with special kids or those less gifted. I don't get it.

Clark always seems to play with a smile on his face and appears to enjoy everything he does, as a young man should. Off the pitch, he is a very friendly lad and actually seems a bit mellow. This I don't get either.

Maybe I just don't understand humans? When I was posted to West Africa in the 1990s, it was simple. Everyone wanted to blow our brains out or hack us to bits with knives. At least that was simple to understand, eh?

it's very strange dr grey, but Saints have got a reputation as being a niggly team even at the best of times (see first match in HEC against Scarlets, the game was full of off the ball stuff), but these two acts just take it that one step further. Can't for the life of my understand why players either behave like that/put themselves in positions like this.

Rush of blood to the head? not sure what else could explain it.

Haven't seen the Callum Clarke incident. Can anyone fill me in? He isn't someone I'd expect to be in this position.

There's a thread on it in the club section with a youtube video link on it, tis horrible.

He's got previous too (admittedly a few years back).

Thanks dreamer. Having seen it I wish I hadn't. That was as nasty a bit of malice as I ever seen. He was a young man I had high hopes for but now I wouldn't be sorry if he never appeared on a rugby pitch again. There is absolutely no place for that in our game.

rugbydreamer wrote:it's very strange dr grey, but Saints have got a reputation as being a niggly team even at the best of times..........

Dream, a little niggle never hurt anyone and happens all the time. But this extra stuff is a recent thing. In past seasons the Saints organisation prided themselves on being proper, fair, but tough and uncompromising. Originally, a beer and boys club, but at the onset of professionalism Saints quickly evolved to the family oriented club we have today. And thats almost 20 years ago.

So, I am lost with all this. I can only imagine what Keith Barwell is thinking. Cripe, this is not the man I know, and not the club I know. Only words I can think to use are that I just don't get it. Really don't.

Dr grey, I'm on about the niggle off the ball, not the usual rugby stuff. In the first match against the Scarlets in the HEC it was horrible, I'm sure I stated as such in the match thread/report regarding it on here, so it's something that's been going on all season.

There was outrage also in how Ashton "cleared" George North out of a ruck. George had to go off injured not long afterwards.

It's something that's been happening all season, got no answerrs as to why, but it's doing a fantastic club no favours and it's giving the club a bad name. If I were a fan, I'd be letting the club know my concerns asap.

Yeah but Mallinder should be England coach right?