BULLS head coach Jimmy Lowes branded referee Joe Cobb a disgrace but admitted his side’s second-half display cost them dear during yesterday’s opening 36-24 Championship defeat at Leigh.

Lowes’ men appeared to be cruising after establishing a 20-6 lead at the end of a first half which saw Newton-le-Willows official Cobb issue five yellow cards and a sixth after the break.

The Bulls boss felt the mass brawl which saw Danny Williams and Gregg McNally sin-binned was as a result of Cobb’s failure to stamp his authority on the game early on.

He insisted a Super League official should have been appointed to referee the eagerly-anticipated showdown.

Lowes said: “We threw that game away – let’s be right. It was down to us and some of the stuff we did in that second half.

“But I thought we were massively undone by the referee and the officials. I thought it was a disgrace in the second half but he just lost control right from the start. We needed a strong ref for a strong game – simple as that.

“The incident (involving Williams) was a result of what had gone on for 15, 20 minutes into the game. He wasn’t the correct referee for the job. We needed a strong referee in there.

“Some of the stuff we’ve worked on, when it came to the crunch, we didn’t do it and I was disappointed about that.

“But if you have to have a go at the referee going down the tunnel at half-time, to make him referee the game differently, then I might have to start doing that. Some stuff crept in that’s not straight-up rugby.”

Adrian Purtell was held up over the line early in the second half but Lowes insisted a try should have been given.

“We did some decent stuff but our second-half performance, we probably left a bit in the dressing room at half-time,” he said.

“We maybe sat back a little thinking ‘we’ve got this game done’ and you can’t do that at any level.

“When push comes to the shove, Purts scores – and he did because I’ve seen it on the video. He scores in that corner and the game might have gone on in a different direction completely.

“But I’m disappointed with a couple of things we had worked on massively beforehand. We were too loose in the second half.”

Meanwhile, a number of complaints are understood to have been made to the match commissioner by Bulls staff about Leigh rugby director Derek Beaumont’s behaviour in the main stand during the game.