“If that is what our game has come to” – Rohan Smith questions yellow cards in Leeds Rhinos defeat

Leeds Rhinos came up short today against Hull KR in a pre-season friendly which saw three yellow cards.

First Elliot Minchella was sent off for 10 minutes after a tackle on Richie Myler, then Aidan Sezer was shown a yellow for a high tackle on Lachlan Coote whose role in the subsequent altercation saw him join Sezer off the field.

Smith questioned the yellow cards after the game, including the one for Minchella, believing that they were unnecessary.

He said: “It would be good if someone from the RFL told me what I was allowed to comment on but Lachlan Coote, you could see the divot where he slipped over. Everyone today seemed to slip when they changed direction.

“He is probably less than half is normal height when his head hits Aidan’s arm.

“Not only was it a complete accident, he apologised and there is a whole keep and carry on, if that is what our game has come to that there’s going to be a push and shove over that kind of high tackle, then I don’t know.

“It is a practice game, so is that a sin bin? I haven’t looked at the tackle on Richie Myler but he said he was fine. What are we doing putting people in the bin for them if they’re not like legit, in a practice game in particular.

“We’re not using the green card but we’re using the yellow card.”

Speaking of the green card, he explained his confusion at this after the game too:

“Good hit out but we definitely got outplayed but I would say we got a reasonable hit out and conditioning despite the repeated stoppages for injuries that didn’t bring about a replacement even on a day with unlimited interchanges.

“I didn’t ask about whether the green card was going to be used in trial games, but I believe that it was agreed that it wasn’t going to be used, or I have since found out.

“But that doesn’t stop that there was a big lengthy stoppages and we’re going into a year that will be critical for our game.

“We had one injury where the referee decided to stop the game because we wanted to continue on so we could get conditioning in a friendly game you want the ball in play.

“You don’t hear a lot much from the RFL over the winter.”