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Red or Yellow?

Dave Elliott

Dave Elliott

Administrator
Staff member
This was given as a Pen ONLY, for me this was a 100% yellow, even thinking about RED, can anyone work out how this was only a pen, the danger looked high enough to me, with no mitigating .



4:10 on the clock

Saints vs Leic 1/11/24
 
Looks like yellow to me if you decide the degree of danger isn't high (and red if you do). Tackler always upright, no change in height by the ball carrier and a clear line of sight to the ball carrier. Can't work out why that would be penalty only.
 
Think it is a red for me. Only mitigation I can see is that the BC is being tackled and there MAY be a slight change in direction but not convinced that it had a massive effect on the BC.
It was a positive tackle making direct contact with the head
 
I am thinking more red tbh. Difficult to see how that is a low degree of danger. The only reasoning I can think of is that the ball carrier was not injured, so that equals low danger in the officials eyes.
 
I thought it was a YC , mitigation given for another tackler being involved.

But he was always upright, no effort to bend and direct head/neck contact.

The excuse that it was low danger doesn't fly with me, as didds says its low danger until he breaks the next players jaw.

If he decided to give a RC for that I wouldn't complain, but its not a pen only.

There seems to me to be a reluctance to RC players and they try to mitigate down every time.

I'm no fan of Karl Dickson but the two red cards he had last week were spot on, he could easily have chickened out but stuck to his guns.

Officials are either serious about protecting the players or they're not, there's no in-between.
 
In the Scotland Fiji game there was clear direct head contact from the Scottish hooker on a Fijian, min YC for me, but because he was already on a YC the TMO never reviewed it.

In a French T14 game I showed a number of clips to another more experienced ref than I . Two were YCs one RC.

I thought that they were all clear RCs and thought that my RC threshold was off. Nope he confirmed that they meet the RC level.

There seems to be a serious push back in what is a RC in the pro game anymore and its not for the good of the game.
 
different incident, but same topic title. Ulster v Stormers

Right in front of Ref originally calls "no foul play", repeats same call during play.
stops play when HIA is going to be required.

in consultation with TMO, call is straight red - no off field review.

TMO/Ref are discussing the incident, "always illegal and no mitigation". It's italian so 2nd language speakers and no real explanation.

At point of contact, tackler is so low that he has a knee on the ground.
I'm lookin at this through blinkered eyes, as a Stormers supporter, but am I missing something?
no wrap? he's the second tackler but how could you wrap around the player's head and neck?


I often find Irish commentary quite interesting to follow in it's unashamed bias, so the response of "a straight red card, my word" really summed this up.
 
He appears to have his arm tucked in and is leading with the shoulder.

Even if the contact was with the ball carriers legs (never mind head) that could be a red card.
 
The difficulty here is that Blue 3 was the second tackler and looks to be leading with the shoulder and so was always likely to be judged as foul play. That said I have some sympathy with him as it looks to me as though the ball carrier dips late and low into the tackle which changes the dynamic. The argument is that as he was always illegal no mitigation is possible however I think that the change of dynamic here may be relevant.
 
Not being able to wrap is not an excuse not to wrap.

If you cant make a safe legal tackle then you simply don't make a tackle.

There are far too many tackles being made where the player leads with the shoulder with the arm low and then AFTER the hit is made the arm comes around because --- physics .

Too many high shots are mitigated because of "low degree of danger" . Yeah he didn't smash his face in this time through pure luck.

This attitude wont change player behavior if they constantly give them a get out of jail card.
 
Yeah, his hand was still by his hip as he drove his shoulder in. If you look at the latest head contact protocol, mitigation doesn't apply to always illegal or highly reckless acts of foul play, and there was a high degree of danger, so red is correct.

As for the ref saying "no foul play", the tucked arm was on the other side of the tackle to him, so it's a good catch by the TMO.
 
Rich_NL said:
Yeah, his hand was still by his hip as he drove his shoulder in.
Click to expand...
incorrect. You'll unfortunately need to watch it frame by frame, but there was an attempt to wrap from both arms. First contact is actually upper arm on the attackers head. If you get a freeze frame, NF's arm looks like it is at his hip, but that's because of the tackle and his arm gets pushed back onto his hip in the collision.

Now if this sounds all dangerous in words, it's because the attacker has dipped so much the tackler has had to get so low that he actually has a knee on the ground. This contact type happens numerous times every game whenever there is a drive to the tryline by a single player who goes in low to score.

Rich_NL said:
If you look at the latest head contact protocol, mitigation doesn't apply to always illegal or highly reckless acts of foul play, and there was a high degree of danger, so red is correct.

As for the ref saying "no foul play", the tucked arm was on the other side of the tackle to him, so it's a good catch by the TMO.
Click to expand...
(got to admit my bias upfront here), but since there was an appeal process might as well update here.

Disciplinary outcome - 6game ban, reduced to 4 due to exemplary record and conduct
Appeal outcome - dismissed - 4 game ban stays.

rugby365.com

Stormers star fails in Euro appeal - ban stays

NEWS: Stormers prop and sometimes captain Neethling Fouché has lost his appeal against a ban.
rugby365.com rugby365.com


This is raising a lot of eyebrows this side of the equator, because the video evidence is there and there is so much mitigation (huge change in height, second tackler). I believe John Dobson Stormers head coach would be quite well respected as a learned rugby man(and former hooker he's seen a thing or two).

“We are extremely disappointed with the outcome of Neethling’s appeal,” Dobson told Netwerk24. “While we respect the disciplinary process, we find it deeply disheartening that a player of Neethling’s calibre – someone who has a spotless disciplinary record in 14 years of professional rugby – could be treated in this way.


“The charge was based on rule 9.16, which requires a player to attempt to grab or wrap his arms around an opponent when making a tackle. In this case, Neethling clearly used both arms. To come to a different conclusion when the footage clearly shows this is simply astonishing.


“Neethling’s body was in a low position in response to a ball-carrier who was dramatically bending over and another player who had already brought the ball-carrier to the ground. If there was any issue, it was one of timing in a split second – caused by the actions of others, not poor technique or deliberate.”

Dobson said that “fairness” – a key principle of the game in terms of how it is played and governed – was not applied in this case.

“When a player who consistently lives up to that principle is subjected to a process that results in an outcome that is clearly out of step with what can be clearly seen on the footage, it raises serious questions,” he said. “It becomes difficult to reconcile what we are told with what we can all see.”
Click to expand...
 
If the RFU DLVs were applied, the ball carrier would probably have been penalised for ‘late and low ‘.
Certainly a close decision. Unfortunately disciplinary panels cannot work off ‘fairness’, only mitigation. Disciplinary panels are tied by how much mitigation they can allow. Here lies the problem with this decision in my opinion.
 
I rather suspect I'd have played on as well.

Strikes me that the tackler was always legal, and attempting to wrap.
 
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