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Recent Owen Farrell ban taken into account in three-game sanction for Harlequins' Elia Elia
By Online Editors
Harlequins hooker Elia Elia has received a three-match ban for being sent off for making a tip tackle on Dan Robson in Monday’s Gallagher Premiership defeat by Wasps.
Elia accepted the charge at an online independent disciplinary panel after being shown a red card for lifting Robson above the horizontal in the 53rd minute of the clash at Twickenham Stoop.
“While the offence was reckless rather than intentional, it was nevertheless clearly dangerous,” said the panel, who reduced the entry-point sanction by three games because of his good record.
"As the referee correctly noted, the fact that Wasps No9 had broken the fall with his arm did not mitigate the offence to bring it below the red card threshold.
"The player had one previous offence recorded against him, which was some time ago while he was 19. Given the factual position was similar to that found in the recent Owen Farrell decision, a 50 per cent discount from the entry point was also applied here.”
With just one round of the regular Premiership season left to play and Quins unable to reach the semi-finals, Elia is not free to play again until November 30.
His suspension covers Harlequins' last game of the 2019/20 season against Leicester this Sunday and the first two games of the 2020/21 season on the November 20 v Exeter Chiefs and the game versus Northampton on the weekend of November 27-29.
England captain Farrell had been banned for five games on September 9, a sanction that was 50 per cent less than the ten-game entry point for his red-carded tackle on Wasps' Charlie Atkinson while playing for Saracens in the Premiership.
That suspension ends on Monday as Saracens' final top-flight game against Bath on Sunday will be the fifth game he will have missed since his disciplinary hearing.
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Latest Comments
Steve Borthwick appointment was misguided based on two flawed premises.
1. An overblown sense of the quality of the premiership rugby. The gap between the Premiership and Test rugby is enormous
2. England needed an English coach who understood English Rugby and it's traditional strengths.
SB won the premiership and was an England forward and did a great job with the Japanese forwards but neither of those qualify you as a tier 1 test manager.
Maybe Felix Jones and Aled Walter's departures are down to the fact that SB is a details man, which work at club level but at test level you need the manager to manage and let the coaches get on and do what they are employed for.
SB criticism of players is straight out of Eddie Jones playbook but his loyalty to keeping out of form players borne out of his perceived sense of betrayal as a player.
In all it doesn't stack up as the qualities needed to be a modern Test coach /Manager
Go to commentsBut still Australians. Only Australia can help itself seems to be the key message.
Blaming Kiwis is deflecting from the actual problem.
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