He has now been told there is a case to answer and a suspension of more than one game will put him out of the next round.The London Broncos have put in an official complaint over a decision by another referee, Stuart Cummins, they believe could have cost them their chance of beating Castleford in their tie on Sunday. Cummins awarded a differential penalty against Castleford at a scrum, meaning the Broncos were not allowed to kick at goal for a possible 8-0 lead. When the kick was moved 10 metres forward for dissent, Cummins would still not let London kick for goal. “We think that was just wrong and we have complained to the league about it,” the Broncos’ coach, Tony Rea, said.The Broncos say they have saved £40,000 thanks to the efforts of volunteers who have rallied around to help them through their transition to new ownership and the new ground at Brentford. “They have been a tremendous help to us,” the club’s chief executive, Nic Cartwright, said.Leeds have apologised to their supporters and those of Hull KR for the 25-minute delay to the kick off in their tie on Friday night. “The main problem was that more than 3,000 fans turned up in the five minutes before the scheduled 8pm kick off,” David Howes, the club’s managing director, said. Matters were made worse by several turnstiles being closed because of rebuilding part of the adjoining cricket ground.The Leeds scrum-half, Rob Burrow, Super League young player of the year last season, has signed a new contract to keep him at Headingley until 2006.

Lee Briers believes he will be fit to play for Warrington in their Super League opener against Halifax on Sunday despite injuring his knee in the cup defeat by St Helens. Salford’s Warren Jowitt needs a groin operation and will miss the first month of the season.Leigh are hoping for a 12,000 capacity crowd for their quarter-final against Wigan. The league is still having discussions with the BBC over which two ties should be televised, with the Halifax v St Helens and Leeds v Wakefield games the likely candidates. The league is looking into reports of crowd trouble in Leigh’s victory over Whitehaven on Sunday.. In a perfect world, the logistics of organising a panel to deal with the appalling Martin Johnson affair before England’s match against France at the Stade de France on Saturday would not be beyond the powers of a national sports body. What kind of principle is it that a referee is the sole arbiter of conduct that could easily finish up in a criminal or civil court? Johnson’s defenders are saying they are merely seeking to apply the laws of the game, which in this case say that once a referee has given his verdict on an incident, however incompetently, there is no power of redress.Two points leap out of the confusion. One is that Johnson’s presence on the field on Saturday would confirm the management of England’s absolute lack of concern for anything but the right result.

The second is that the game is in desperate need of a new set of laws. One of the most basic should be the power to punish unbridled thuggery properly, whether it is delivered by a schoolboy, an ageing recidivist in the thirds, or the captain of England.. Second-row forwards, now known as locks, tend to come in two categories There are big bullies, and there are gentle giants. There is no bottle of champagne for correctly naming the group to which Martin Johnson belongs. He is less common than he used to be, at any rate at the higher levels of rugby union football. The game is faster, the referee has the touch judges or linesmen to help him and, not least, television can show and endlessly replay kicks or punches.Johnson is not a villain. One reason why he does not fall into this company is that his misdeeds are so obvious.

Full of indignation, he will swing at opponents like a British heavyweight hope of the 1940s. Sometimes he makes contact, as he did with Robbie Russell, the Saracens hooker, who needed six stitches and whose injury is the cause of the most recent dispute.Nor does he confine himself to his fists. Last season it was his knee which broke several of the Saracens outside-half’s ribs. In short – and to avoid reading out a list of previous convictions which would take up the rest of this column – Johnson has form as long as your arm.There is undoubtedly a tendency for referees to pick on such players or, if you prefer to put it slightly differently, to keep a close watch on their activities. Paul Ringer, the Welsh flanker in 1978-80, had the reputation of being a villain which was not entirely unjustified.