Willie Peters labelled Mikey Lewis’ sin-binning at York Knights a brain explosion that contributed to Hull KR losing the game on Thursday night.
The Robins were stunned at the LNER Community Stadium as they were beaten by the newly promoted York 19-18, with an Ata Hingano drop goal being the difference on the night. However, the Robins were 18-6 up heading into the final quarter of the contest before Mikey Lewis committed a foul that can only be described as stupid.
The England international could be clearly seen tripping York playmaker Liam Harris shortly after kicking the ball and that resulted in the Robins man being sent for 10 minutes in the sin bin by referee Liam Rush.
York made the most of the numerical advantage as Sam Wood scored a second try of the game down Lewis’ side and with the wind in their sails, the Knights scored a third try of the game through Scott Galeano.
And, with KR floundering late on in the game, Hingano slotted the one pointer to seal the biggest Super League shock in recent memory.
“I’m disappointed,” Peters said when asked about Lewis. “Mikey’s come a long way in that area and it was a whatever you call it, a brain explosion, I wouldn’t know what to call it because he’s the only one that could say what happened at the time.
“We were in control and we lost control off the back of it. We didn’t handle it well as a team.”
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On the potential of further punishments that could see Lewis miss the World Club Challenge, Peters added: “I don’t know what you usually get for trips. It is what is. You get what you deserve in this game and whatever he gets, he gets.”
It was a sloppy performance from KR from start to finish in truth, with the Robins keeping referee Rush busy and Peters has told his team to own their ill-disciplined performance.
“I don’t think we’re that ill-disciplined as a team,” he said. “We work hard in that area and we need to look at them case by case.
“I will say now that was an ill-disciplined performance by us and we need to own that but I need to see what the penalties were for and if they were warranted.”
He added: “We knew exactly what they [York] were going to bring. They were very good and it’s no surprise.
“They got the crowd involved and they ended up coming up over the top of us and we got what we deserved. In this game you get what you deserve and we got what we deserved.”
