Red-carded O'Mahony banned until round five of the Six Nations
Ireland back row Peter O’Mahony won't be available to appear in the Guinness Six Nations championship again until his team's round five match versus England on March 20 after he was banned from their next three matches. O'Mahony was red-carded by referee Wayne Barnes just 13 minutes into Ireland's defeat to Wales and he will now miss next Sunday's game at home to France, as well as the following games versus Italy and Scotland.
A statement from the Six Nations read: "Ireland back row forward appeared before an independent disciplinary committee, comprised of Mike Hamlin (England), Frank Hadden (Scotland) and Val Toma (Romania), via video conference.
"O’Mahony received a red card during the Wales vs Ireland match on February 7 at the Principality Stadium for an infringement of law 9.20 (a) and (b) (dangerous play in a ruck or maul) in the 13th minute of the match.
"The player admitted the act of dangerous play in a ruck and that the offending merited a red card. The player did not seek to challenge the referee's decision. The committee considered all the relevant evidence, including the player's oral evidence, together with the clips of the incident.
"In assessing the seriousness of the offending, the committee found that the offending was reckless. They were satisfied that the player's conduct breached World Rugby law 9.20(a), in that he charged into a ruck. Charging includes any contact made without binding onto another player in the ruck or maul. The committee noted that the offending involved reckless contact with the head of the Wales No3 (Tomas Francis).
"As the conduct involved contact with the head, although noting that no injury was suffered by the Wales No3, the committee determined that the entry point was mid-range, which for this offence is six weeks. It was accepted that there were no off-field aggravating factors, and the disciplinary committee concluded after careful consideration of the player’s record and conduct in the hearing, that the player was entitled to a 50 per cent reduction of sanction in mitigation.
"The player is suspended from February 7 to March 14, which represents three meaningful matches to the player. The player is free to play again on March 15."
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Skelton may be brought back for the Wallabies so that would be the only reason that may hinder Wilson. Easily the form, most skilful and game IQ of any Oz 8. Valentini’s best and favourite position is 6, but lineouts may be an issue with Skelton, Valentini and Wilson. Will be interesting what Schmidt goes for but for me Wilson should be picked on form. Schmidt rewards work rate, skill and consistency. All that glitters every so often won’t be in contention. Greely is one of those players that has a knack of making the right decision. A coach is going to love him because he knows week in week out he’s going to get the job done. The second try Greely wasn’t the guy who made the initial break it was Flook, Greely was at the bottom of the ruck when Flook was off along the sideline. Greely got up and made the effort to catch up with play but also read the play nicely and hit the pass from Campbell at pace and then held the pass beautifully to Ryan.
Go to commentsSharks deserved to be far further back by the last quarter. Their tackling was awful, their set pieces were disappointing, their defensive organization was poor (especially on the Kok side of the D line), they kept making unnecessary errors, and they never looked like cracking the Clermont defense during those first 60m. Masuku kept them in touch, with some help from the Clermont generosity on penalty opportunities. Agree with the writer of this article. It was belligerence, and ability to raise their pressure game just enough, that turned the last quarter into a Bok-style shutout. Clermont have a reputation of not playing the full 80m, and there was a bit of that for sure. But, quite often when the intensity of a team drops off in the last quarter credit is due to the opponent for tiring them out. At 60m, with the Kok try, you thought that just maybe the game was on. At 70m, with the Mapimpi contribution, one felt that Clermont were fading, while facing a team that would maintain the pressure game through the final whistle. Good win in the end, but the Sharks are still playing way below their potential. And with their resources, and a coach that has had enough time to figure things out, they are running out of excuses.
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