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Kockott gets off lightly despite pleading guilty to making 'contact with eye area'
By Online Editors
Castres Olympique scrum half, Rory Kockott, has been suspended following an independent Disciplinary Hearing in Paris today arising from his club’s Heineken Champions Cup, Round 4 match against Munster Rugby at Stade Pierre Fabre.
Kockott was cited by the match Citing Commissioner, Chris Catling (England), for making contact with the eye and/or the eye area of the Munster wing forward, Chris Cloete, in the 21st minute of the match in contravention of Law 9.12.
Law 9.12 – Contact with the eye
Under World Rugby’s Sanctions for Foul Play, Law 9.12 carries the following sanction entry points – Low end: 12 weeks; Mid-range: 18 weeks; Top end: 24 to 208 weeks
Law 9.12 – Contact with the eye area
Under World Rugby’s Sanctions for Foul Play, Law 9.12 carries the following sanction entry points – Low end: 4 weeks; Mid-range: 8 weeks; Top end: 12 to 52 weeks
An independent Disciplinary Committee consisting of Pamela Woodman (Scotland), Chair, Anthony Davies (England) and Leon Lloyd (England), heard evidence and submissions from Kockott, who pleaded guilty to the charge of making contact with the eye area, from the Castres Olympique Managing Director, Matthias Rolland, from the Castres Olympique legal representative, Clément Germain, and from the EPCR Disciplinary Officer, Liam McTiernan.
The Committee upheld the citing complaint in that it warranted a red card and found that Kockott had made contact with Cloete’s eye area. It was decided that the act of foul play was at the low end of World Rugby’s sanctions and four weeks was selected as the appropriate entry point.
Due to the player’s guilty plea and good conduct at the hearing, the Committee decided to reduce the sanction by one week before imposing a three-week suspension.
Kockott is free to play on Monday, 7 January 2019, and both he and EPCR have the right to appeal the decision.
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Latest Comments
Well that sux.
Go to commentsLike I've said before about your idea (actually it might have been something to do with mine, I can't remember), I like that teams will a small sustainable league focus can gain the reward of more consistent CC involvement. I'd really like the most consistent option available.
Thing is, I think rugby can do better than footballs version. I think for instance I wanted everyone in it to think they can win it, where you're talking about the worst teams not giving up because they are so far off the pace we get really bad scoreline when that and giving up to concentrate on the league is happening together.
So I really like that you could have a way to remedy that, but personally I would want my model to not need that crutch. Some of this is the same problem that football has. I really like the landscape in both the URC and Prem, but Ireland with Leinster specifically, and France, are a problem IMO. In football this has turned CL pool stages in to simply cash cow fixtures for the also ran countries teams who just want to have a Real Madrid or ManC to lose to in their pool for that bumper revenue hit. It's always been a comp that had suffered for real interest until the knockouts as well (they might have changed it in recent years?).
You've got some great principles but I'm not sure it's going to deliver on that hard hitting impact right from the start without the best teams playing in it. I think you might need to think about the most minimal requirement/way/performance, a team needs to execute to stay in the Champions Cup as I was having some thougt about that earlier and had some theory I can't remember. First they could get entry by being a losing quarter finalist in the challenge, then putting all their eggs in the Champions pool play bucket in order to never finish last in their pool, all the while showing the same indifference to their league some show to EPCR rugby now, just to remain in champions. You extrapolate that out and is there ever likely to be more change to the champions cup that the bottom four sides rotate out each year for the 4 challenge teams? Are the leagues ever likely to have the sort of 'flux' required to see some variation? Even a good one like Englands.
I'd love to have a table at hand were you can see all the outcomes, and know how likely any of your top 12 teams are going break into Champions rubyg on th back it it are?
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