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Rugby Europe issues hefty bans to Spanish players over controversial Belgium match
By Nathaniel Cope
Rugby Europe has handed out bans of 121 weeks to five Spanish players who were involved in a bust-up with a Romanian referee over his decision making during their defeat to Belgium in a World Cup qualifier.
The Spanish Rugby Federation made a formal complaint to World Rugby and sent a video with 19 disputed refereeing decisions from their 18-10 defeat on March 18th.
The loss denied Spain an automatic place at the 2019 Rugby World Cup and their players surrounded the Romanian referee, Vlad Iordachescu after their loss.
World Rugby has already announced that it will investigate the recent Rugby Europe Championship match between sides and the ineligibility issues that subsequently came to light in the aftermath of the tournament.
But in the meantime a Rugby Europe Independent Judicial Committee has sanctioned five Spanish players in bans totaling over two years. Sebastien Rouet has been given the heftiest punishment, 43 weeks, for "physical abuse of a Match Official and verbal abuse", while scrum-half Guillaume Rouet has been given a 36-week ban for the same offence.
There were 14-week bans given to backrow's Lucas Guillaume, Pierre Barthere, along with outhalf Mathieu Belie for "threatening actions/words at a Match Official".
In a statement Rugby Europe said "These sanctions are applicable immediately for all players’ rugby activities (clubs and national teams). Players have the right of appeal within 7 days of receipt of the written decision. The misconduct complaint against the Spanish Rugby Union was suspended and a further hearing date will be set."
Yesterday the International Rugby Players has called on World Rugby to take more control over global tournaments, after the fallout from the recent Rugby Europe Championship.
The official players representative body also called for greater transparency around the Rugby World Cup qualification process, aligned with enhanced accountability from Regional Associations.
“We support World Rugby’s efforts to eradicate any perceived manipulation of fair play,” said CEO of International Rugby Players, Omar Hassanein.
“But this investigation highlights the need to closely monitor the activity of regional associations, particularly around Rugby World Cup qualification matches.
“Players, especially at Tier Two level, sacrifice a lot to follow their Rugby World Cup dream and, if integrity is undermined, it will erode the trust which exists between players, administrators and fans of our sport. The players in this situation deserve better than this.”
International Rugby Players welcomes World Rugby’s decision to form an independent disputes committee to examine issues around the Rugby Europe competition.
“We have seen how damaging it can be to the reputation of other sports when questions about integrity have been raised and are not dealt with properly,” added Hassanein.
“Competitions at all levels of the professional game need to be administered with the same high standards to preserve the integrity and values of our sport.”
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Latest Comments
Nah, that just needs some more variation. Chip kicks, grubber stabs, all those. Will Jordan showed a pretty good reason why the rush was bad for his link up with BB.
If you have an overlap on a rush defense, they naturally cover out and out and leave a huge gap near the ruck.
It also helps if both teams play the same rules. ARs set the offside line 1m past where the last mans feet were😅
Go to commentsYeah nar, should work for sure. I was just asking why would you do it that way?
It could be achieved by outsourcing all your IP and players to New Zealand, Japan, and America, with a big Super competition between those countries raking it in with all of Australia's best talent to help them at a club level. When there is enough of a following and players coming through internally, and from other international countries (starting out like Australia/without a pro scene), for these high profile clubs to compete without a heavy australian base, then RA could use all the money they'd saved over the decades to turn things around at home and fund 4 super sides of their own that would be good enough to compete.
That sounds like a great model to reset the game in Aus. Take a couple of decades to invest in youth and community networks before trying to become professional again. I just suggest most aussies would be a bit more optimistic they can make it work without the two decades without any pro club rugby bit.
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