SWINDON Wildcats head coach Ryan Aldridge was left frustrated by the standard of refereeing in the English Premier League after Sunday’s defeat to MK Lightning.

Jan Kostal was on the end of an elbow from Grant McPherson in the third period on Sunday night which led to a mass brawl.

Kostal found his way into the sin-bin for roughing while McPherson was given the equivalent penalty for the use of an elbow.

Aldridge is now calling for harsher sanctions on penalties that could leave players seriously injured in order to protect his players.

“I’m probably the one who used to be the most against the refs and now I seem to be the one fighting their cause, it’s a tough job but quite frankly the refs aren’t good enough at this level,” he said.

“They haven’t probably played hockey and if they have they probably weren’t good enough to play and they just don’t know enough about the game.

“A guy who is known to be a cheat runs into an honest hockey player like Jan with a flying elbow and he doesn’t get called on it.

“Other players around the league keep talking about changing the referee to try and improve it but I’m the one that says that it is never going to change, we’ve got to deal with it.

“It is getting to the point now where it is every night.

“All the dangerous plays have got to go out of the game. We are the only league in the world right now that still lets the cheap stuff get away and just get minor penalties; it has got to get abandoned.

“If that had knocked Jan out, a flying elbow on the blindside, who knows how long he would have been out for, we’re talking about concussions but people don’t come down on this.

“We’ve got to worry about our own team, I can’t sort the refereeing out, so I will worry about our team and get us battling harder and working harder and maybe we should start being cheaper as well.”