Bradford Bulls boss Kurt Haggerty has given his take on the error match officials made during Saturday’s clash with St Helens.
With the game on a knife edge, St Helens saw Joe Shrorrocks sent to the sin bin for dangerous contact when tackling an already wrapped player. The clock was at 63 minutes and 18 seconds when Shorrocks was shown his yellow card with St Helens winning 20-16 at the time.
However, due to a confusion around timings, the loose-forward would spend just eight and a half minutes on the touchline, giving St Helens an advantage before they eventually scored the decisive try of the game through Deon Cross.
The RFL have since admitted an error was made with off-field officials at the Brewdog Stadium failing to follow the correct protocols in regards to time keeping. The governing body have issued an apology to the Bulls, who have every right to feel aggrieved, and a spokesperson confirming to Serious About Rugby League that the full facts of the incident will be used to ensure the mistake never happens again.
Shorrocks has since been banned for two matches by the Match Review Panel, but that is of no help to Bradford, of course, who were ultimately handed their second defeat of the Super League season.
“I questioned it at the time,” Haggerty, speaking ahead of Bradford Bulls’ Challenge Cup clash with Wigan Warriors, said on the incident. “It just felt too soon but I wasn’t sure on the detail and the clarity around it.
“I went and spoke to the fourth official and he was pretty unsure as well. I needed to see the clarity first before I did anything with it. The day after we got the phone call to let us know they got it wrong. They had left the time running during the captain’s challenge, someone didn’t stop the clock and that’s where the issue came with it.
“You have an idea and because the game was so close as well, it was a big moment when he came back onto the field. We always track those kind of things. It’s human error, we’ve had numerous apologies and it’s still hard to take. Ultimately, it had a big boon on the outcome of the game but these things so happen unfortunately.
“We’ve been guaranteed that it will never happen again and I hope that no team goes through what we went through in regards to it being such a close game and losing it in the manner we did because of the sin-binning situation.”
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