Watch: Ma'a Nonu red-carded in Top 14 after decking Lyon halfback with strike to the head in bizarre reaction
Ex-All Black Ma'a Nonu's return stint with French club Toulon has helped the club's resurgence in 2021 after a horror slide down the Top 14 ladder last year, but his latest performance has earned a red card.
Returning to New Zealand with the Blues in 2019, Nonu moved to the MLR for a short stint with the San Diego Legion before Covid-19 caused the season to be cancelled.
As rugby resumed, Nonu answered an SOS call from Toulon as an injury replacement and has been enjoying the club's fruitful 2021 season.
In Toulon's latest league match against Lyon, Nonu took exception to halfback Jean Marc Doussain and responded by striking him with an elbow to the head that immediately stopped play.
Doussain had checked Nonu off-the-ball with a shoulder to slow him down as he was chasing to make a tackle which triggered Nonu to react violently with a swinging arm. The Lyon halfback was not expecting the forearm to the face, collapsing to the ground after being hit without looking.
The English commentator knew immediately the severity of the play saying: "oh he's going to get a red card for that. He's smashed Doussain in the face with his arm."
"I don't know what Doussain did to provoke that, but Ma'a Nonu is going to get a red card."
The commentator's prediction come true moments later as Nonu was handed his marching orders in just the 27th minute. For Doussain's part, he was yellow carded for the block on Nonu.
Moments earlier Toulon had edged a little closer with a penalty goal to close the gap to 15-6 but down to 14-men Lyon were able to pile on a bonus point victory, winning by 54-16.
Former Toulon winger Josua Tuisova scored a brace against his old side, while Toulon's lone try came from a penalty try of their own in the 68th minute.
After the loss, Toulon slipped back to 7th on the table with 11 wins after 20 matches this season.
Earlier this month Nonu put in a magnificent defensive performance to help his side down a star-studded Racing 92 side, when they had all of their international stars back during the Six Nations break.
Nonu kept Virimi Vakatawa, Finn Russell and Simon Zebo in check as his side came away with a close 25-21 win. It was the second time they have defeated the Paris club, having won 29-23 in January.
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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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