Pichot on consistency and the Frank's incident.

[Shaggy]

Hi Everybody,

I haven't been on here for a while, but just thought I'd add my two cents worth.

I think the only way that "justice" for want of a better word, to be done, is that WR adopt a blanket rule, that there is a blanket rule that a player faces the judiciary if the accused comes in contact with the eye region.

Yes, let the judiciary view all of the evidence, even if it's completely obvious that there's no case to answer, and maybe release the evidence as to why a player hasn't been punished.

If player welfare is paramount (and it should be), we want to discourage players from going anywhere near the eyes, so if they know they are going to have an automatic visit to the judiciary, it will hopefully lessen the number of incidents.

 

[ncurd]

I agree with you both. Personally I'm up for an overhaul of the system as Cooky describes it.

First up the citing coissioner is only there to determine if there 'might' be a case to answer for regardless of the referee position. Tackle over the horizontol your off the citing board, place your hand in the eye are off you go to.

The citing board should be equally willing giving a non guilty verdict over a guilty (this currently does not appear to be the case). But they shhould take into consideration referee and touch judge positions and their testimony to their decisions making.

We need to stop the ref's are infallable culture to these decisions.

I'd also and I know I've said this quite a few times before is do NHL style video explaining the decisions making behind a citing.


Higher bodies should be allowed to call into question the determination of a citing board or citing commisioner about whether a situation should cited and punished.


The major issue with this incident is there appeared with the Francis and Ashton incidents that was clear attempt by the authorities to dissuade contact to the eye areas (there may have no been a formal directive). The Franks incident appears to show there an extreme difference in how thos rules are being interpreted. I fail to understand how we can tolerate to have a system that bans players for months and another escapes a yellow card for extremely similar offences.

As noted the spear tackle has gotten to a stage of very little debate (unless you talk to the Welsh) we should really have the same for every citable offence.

 

[Shaggy]

The spear tackle example is a great example, and also raises another point I meant to make, and that is, that we don't want serious injuries to initiate change, we want change to occur to prevent injuries. A preemptive, rather than a reactive culture needs to occur in the law making.

... and yes, for my initial suggestion to take place, the judiciary needs to be willing to have a possibility of a not guilty verdict.

 

[Cruz_del_Sur]

In this case, the Citing Commissioner has seen the ALL of the video evidence and has made his determination based ALL of the evidence available to him, and after seeing ALL of the video evidence, he has determined that what Franks did (while it was very likely to have been illegal foul play) DID NOT MEET HIS CRITERIA FOR A RED CARD

If that is the case you are changing one problem for others.

One one hand, you demand rangerancher to show his evidence will you seem to be relatiely happy with the citing commissioners' word without a shred of evidence from his side.
Second, uou keep claiming you are not defending Franks but you keep coming up with reasons why it is plausible for him not to be cited. I didn't see you doing that when Galarza got cited, so i have to shout bias.

Third, if that is the case, then the inconsistency becomes: why did Galarza's meet the red card criteria and this did not?

Everyone outside New Zealand, press, fans, players, former players, coaches, WR officials, the lot, are as united as i've ever seen on an issue, so either this is the biggest conspiracy in rugby history or, as evidence strongly suggests, something went terribly wrong.

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Hi Everybody,

I haven't been on here for a while, but just thought I'd add my two cents worth.

I think the only way that "justice" for want of a better word, to be done, is that WR adopt a blanket rule, that there is a blanket rule that a player faces the judiciary if the accused comes in contact with the eye region.

Yes, let the judiciary view all of the evidence, even if it's completely obvious that there's no case to answer, and maybe release the evidence as to why a player hasn't been punished.

If player welfare is paramount (and it should be), we want to discourage players from going anywhere near the eyes, so if they know they are going to have an automatic visit to the judiciary, it will hopefully lessen the number of incidents.

This is all very good, but i was pretty damm sure that was already the case, at least in practice. You have several cases over the last 2 years where not everyone liked it, but everyone understood the rule/how the rule was applied. It was consistent. People questioned the rule back then but there was consistency.
The problem was when Franks did pretty much the same thing and got away with it.

 

[smartcooky]

In which case your defending a **** system that allows players to be inconsistently punished for similar offences.

OH FOR CHRIST'S SAKE, READ WHAT I HAVE BEEN SAYING

You, and others, are just glossing over what I have been posting, putting your own personal spin on it, and then failing to understand concepts that a retarded monkey could grasp

I am not defending anything or anyone... I am simply telling you how it is!

It's right the citing commissioner should not consider what the player has done previously. But what you are suggesting is he should willfully ignore how others have interpreted the law. How are we going to ever have some level of consistency in aplication if that's the case?

Have a think about the implications of what you are expecting

In order for the CC to do what you are suggesting, he would have to be familiar with every citing of every player at every level of the game throughout the world, and be familiar with the judicial outcomes of all of them.... the CC has 24 hours to cite players from a match; not 24 weeks!!!!!

Your also conveniently forgetting in the original thread you said multiples times Franks should of been cited.

That was before I saw the head on view. It changed everything

And Smartcooky you can keep saying the bit of citing commissioner has seen all the angles toy your blue in the face. But your ignoring the fact we understand that but disagree with it with the angles we have seen. And don't just take it on blind faith that he's right.

If it comes to choosing between accepting the determination of a highly qualified and very competent former international rugby referee who has seen ALL of the evidence, and a that of a couple of Neville Nobodies on an internet forum, who have NOT seen all of the evidence, I know who I'm believing.

 

[Sker]

In which case your defending a **** system that allows players to be inconsistently punished for similar offences. [/quopte

OH FOR CHRIST'S SAKE, READ WHAT I HAVE BEEN SAYING

You, and others, are just glossing over what I have been posting, putting your own personal spin on it, and then failing to understand concepts that a retarded monkey could grasp

I am not defending anything or anyone... I am simply telling you how it is!



Have a think about the implications of what you are expecting

In order for the CC to do what you are suggesting, he would have to be familiar with every citing of every player at every level of the game throughout the world, and be familiar with the judicial outcomes of all of them.... the CC has 24 hours to cite players from a match; not 24 weeks!!!!!



That was before I saw the head on view. It changed everything



If it comes to choosing between accepting the determination of a highly qualified and very competent former international rugby referee who has seen ALL of the evidence, and a that of a couple of Neville Nobodies on an internet forum, who have NOT seen all of the evidence, I know who I'm believing.

Wow Cooky, really?

Disappointed mate.

 

[smartcooky]

In regards to Shaggy's and Heineken's posts, you can regard the Citing Commissioner as rugby's equivalent of the Crown Prosecution Service (CPS). For any American readers, they are like the Office of the District Attorney.

The Citing Commissioner looks at the evidence and decides if the offence/infringement he sees meets red card card test. In the same way that the CPS looks at the the evidence against a suspect and decides if they have a good enough case to charge the suspect, so the CC weighs up whether the Judicial Officer will have the evidence he needs to find the player guilty. Part of that determination boils down to whether of not there is either exculpatory evidence or whether there is evidence that would tend to cast doubt on the guilt of the suspect/player.

The head on view, while not exculpatory, would certainly be brought to the hearing by Franks' lawyer and the JO would almost certainly have to decide not guilty based on that alone. If the other views we have not seen (and which the CC has seen) also show no gouging, and therefore don't show anything that would lead to Franks' actions meeting the red card criteria, then a not guilty verdict is a gold plated certainty.

Instead of arguing over whether Franks should have been cited, we would now be arguing over why he was found not guilty, and all the usual suspects and Neville Nobodies would be accusing the JO of inconsistency instead of the CC.

 

[ncurd]

You're failing to understand we get that we're questioning whether that system is fit for purpose. I respect your knowledge in how things work especially when it comes to full explanantion of a law. However quite frequently your interpretation of indivdual incidents are blinded by what you want to see.

So you completely changed your view based on one camera angle, you realise that camera's with a head on view give no definition to depth and quite frequently 'lie' right? A few year back Sky Sports in the UK demonstarted this with slip catching close to the ground in Cricket they showed the camera gave the appearance of dropped cataches when in reality the ball was being cleanly caught. This is alsp how film makers use tricks like forced perspective to make Ian McKellen look twice the size of Elijah Wood in the LotR movie in some scenes.
So with one camera angle telling you it's a citable offence and the other saying now you have no definitve evidence either way and last I checked your not privvy to other bit of eveidence. so you choosing the camera angle that fits your side of the side story.

This is a professional sport I don't think it's unwarrented at this level for citing commissioners to have some level of knowledge of what other incidents of a similar nature have obtained. Infact I expect that level of professionalism from a professional body. We know referee's are quite frequenctly retrained and given guidence on law interpretations. Why do we suddenly not expect that over this incident? This quite frankly looks amatuerish that one guy can receive months off but another gets nothing.

As to the fact they're highly trained professional I'll remind you that everytime you say they got something wrong from now on especially if it's Wayne Barnes.

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I think we understand the citing commisioners role but you just said he can't possibly be thought to bring in consistency because he can't possibly know everything. Doesn't that make a citing commisioner woefully unqualified for that kind of role?

As to arguing with the citing commisions choice, well I'm unsure I probably would argue at the moment. Which is why I consistently call for all angles to be shown with a full explanantion of the decision made. The reasons there is an arguement is because similar incidents have had players removed from the game for months and this one appears to warrent nothing. Why? because we said so. And that's your attitude as well no actual explanantion to why this one differs from the others only that you disagree with other interpretations as well.


You also keep spouting off it doesn't meet the crteria for a red card but earlier you were saying there was no criteria or thresholds just indivdual interpretation.

 

[Immenso]

I thought it looked terrible on initial viewing. Not a gouge from the head on view, though.
Link below, use of the word "facial" lets you know what the producers of The Breakdown think ....

Still don't think it should be legal to stop an opponent driving through a maul by pulling on his face .....

They'll probably change that now, because of the media mileage of the bad angles, and come up with a WR directive about duty of care whenever a hand goes near the face/eyes .... And some Welshman will get red carded in a World Cup semi final 7 years later due to 'the Franks Rule'

https://youtu.be/Mk4klCK4f_o

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The similarity to the Galarza incident is striking.

https://youtu.be/MxfdU23uAUM

Although not seen it front on.

Rentalick lost a contact lense in that incident, so contact with the eye was made. But yeah, looks accidental.
Galarza looks more accidental than Franks, with difference being Franks missed the eye but deliberately 'facialed' him in an attempt to stop him driving through. Where as Galarza has one big grab, unsighted, but makes contact with the eye.

 

[ncurd]

Lets be clear here this is very different to the 'BOD incident' which was an extremely dangarous and malicious act that resulted in a player being badly injured. Under the current system both players would of served lenthy bans and rightly so. They only got away with it because the system was woefully inadaquate at the time to punish players if referee had failed to handle it properly.

This far less clear cut and the concept that Franks was behaving in a malicious manner with a intent to injure is laughable and I don't think anyone is suggesting they are in the same league. What it has highlighted is how woefully incosistent our body for punishment is.

Personally on eye gouging I'd like to see hand to face (including fending off) expressly forbidden, minimum yellow card for extremely incidental offences (the kind where a players hand has reason to be above shoulder height), red card for anything else but I'd also bring down the minimum ban a large amount for incidents like these. Althought the fact Franks had to be told twice to stop and repositioned his hand means he should get a little more than the minimum.

I mean look at this way is there any good reason why a player should be touching anothers players face?

 

[smartcooky]

I thought it looked terrible on initial viewing. Not a gouge from the head on view, though.
Link below, use of the word "facial" lets you know what the producers of The Breakdown think ....

Still don't think it should be legal to stop an opponent driving through a maul by pulling on his face .....

I don't think players should be allowed to grab an opponent's head at all. ALL contact should be below the line of the shoulders, same as for tackling.

So you completely changed your view based on one camera angle

Yes, the clear camera angle

you realise that camera's with a head on view give no definition to depth and quite frequently 'lie' right? A few year back Sky Sports in the UK demonstarted this with slip catching close to the ground in Cricket they showed the camera gave the appearance of dropped cataches when in reality the ball was being cleanly caught. This is alsp how film makers use tricks like forced perspective to make Ian McKellen look twice the size of Elijah Wood in the LotR movie in some scenes.

All very interesting if you are interested in that stuff; and I am, its my stock and trade.

Its not called forced perspective (which is a deliberate special effect achieved by intentional placement of objects varying distances in the depth of field) its called foreshortening which is something that happens naturally with cameras and lenses as a consequence of trying to display a 3D reality in a 2D medium.

In any case, its all completely irrelevant to this discussion. Franks' thumb and Douglas' face are not far enough apart in the depth of field to show any foreshortening

So with one camera angle telling you it's a citable offence and the other saying now you have no definitve evidence either way and last I checked your not privvy to other bit of eveidence. so you choosing the camera angle that fits your side of the side story.

No, that is your personal spin on what I have been saying, and its wrong.

The side on camera angles appear to show hands in eyes, and if that was all that was available, then Franks ought to have been cited based on that. (this is what I said earlier in the other thread)

So, for arguments sake, lets assume that he was cited, and that on the morning of his hearing, his Lawyer gets hold of the previously unseen head on view. He takes that to the hearing... what do you think would happen? (You already know what I think would happen; its why I changed my mind about the citing after saw that view).

You also keep spouting off it doesn't meet the crteria for a red card but earlier you were saying there was no criteria or thresholds just indivdual interpretation.

This makes no sense, unless of course, you have, once again, not understood what I have been telling you.

There is no official written, black letter red card criteria, there is only the opinion of the referee/CC. There was a well known English rugby referee called Fred Howard, who had a great description of his red card test.

"You know it is sending off when you find your finger pointing to the sideline"

However, for me, my red card test is... "would I, as the referee, have given a red card for what I saw?"

Now, if I have only seen what Franks did from either of the side views, then probably yes, or at the very least, a yellow card. However, had I seen it from the same angle that Romain Poite saw it, which was almost the same as the head-on camera angle, then definitely not, but I definitely would have penalised him, and might have yellow carded him.

 

[ncurd]

Okay first off I'm obviously not technically minded in that way and know all the terms (although I do like just like every topic underneath the sun do find it interesting). But I wasn't suggesting it was forced perspective (which I know what it is) just that a head on camera angle doesn't nessarially tell the whole truth of what it's in the picture. As is clear from both angles one is cleary not telling us 'the truth' of what happened.

As to the lawyer the clear difference for me is that the arguement is put forward to more than one person (I think it's currently three?) coming together to make the best judgement. Not the judgement of one person. I think especially with the 24 hour time limit that a citing commisioner should just be asking if there is sufficent evidence for it to go the board not whether a likely guilty verdict can be obtained. Afterall this is not a court of law we shouldn't really be caring if it warrants wasting the boards time.

The issue I have is one of consistency and it doesn't really matter if the Franks decision is correct or Ashton is correct. The disparagery between the two resulting disciplinary actions is hugely problematic in my book and it's quite clear the authorities don't want to explain themselves to why both should be treated differently. They've got one wrong and they are not making it clear which is the correct view.

 

[Shaggy]

If that is the case you are changing one problem for others.

One one hand, you demand rangerancher to show his evidence will you seem to be relatiely happy with the citing commissioners' word without a shred of evidence from his side.
Second, uou keep claiming you are not defending Franks but you keep coming up with reasons why it is plausible for him not to be cited. I didn't see you doing that when Galarza got cited, so i have to shout bias.

Third, if that is the case, then the inconsistency becomes: why did Galarza's meet the red card criteria and this did not?

Everyone outside New Zealand, press, fans, players, former players, coaches, WR officials, the lot, are as united as i've ever seen on an issue, so either this is the biggest conspiracy in rugby history or, as evidence strongly suggests, something went terribly wrong.

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This is all very good, but i was pretty damm sure that was already the case, at least in practice. You have several cases over the last 2 years where not everyone liked it, but everyone understood the rule/how the rule was applied. It was consistent. People questioned the rule back then but there was consistency.
The problem was when Franks did pretty much the same thing and got away with it.

Well, I'm talking about a specific rule that says "you will not contact a player around the eyes", and that specifies that all instances WILL BE referred to the judiciary OR some written requirement that the officials must refer it to the judiciary, and the player must appear ... I'm not talking about interpretations here, i'm talking direct instruction, so if such a thing exists in the law WR should be going after SANZAAR and it's officials.

At the very least, there should be some guidelines/directives for the citing commissioner to release evidence as to why the player hasn't been cited.

Lets be clear here this is very different to the 'BOD incident' which was an extremely dangarous and malicious act that resulted in a player being badly injured. Under the current system both players would of served lenthy bans and rightly so. They only got away with it because the system was woefully inadaquate at the time to punish players if referee had failed to handle it properly.

This far less clear cut and the concept that Franks was behaving in a malicious manner with a intent to injure is laughable and I don't think anyone is suggesting they are in the same league. What it has highlighted is how woefully incosistent our body for punishment is.

Personally on eye gouging I'd like to see hand to face (including fending off) expressly forbidden, minimum yellow card for extremely incidental offences (the kind where a players hand has reason to be above shoulder height), red card for anything else but I'd also bring down the minimum ban a large amount for incidents like these. Althought the fact Franks had to be told twice to stop and repositioned his hand means he should get a little more than the minimum.

I mean look at this way is there any good reason why a player should be touching anothers players face?

I think an eye gouge could have very serious repercussions for the player on the receiving end, so yes, the non contact with the hands to the face makes sense ... I just think that professional sporting bodies can be slow to act sometimes, and they wait for a serious incident to occur, rather than changing the laws to prevent it

 

[Ragey Erasmus]

You have video evidence of these "2 distinct occasions", I mean the head on view not the side on views that we have seen, are unclear.

If you have this evidence, show it!!

You mean apart from the 2 images and the video!? You have been presented with evidence and are simply denying it. I've told you a billion times, the first incident Franks arm is going over the Aussie's shoulder and the second his arm is going under the Aussies shoulder. In both cases his hand starts away from the eyes and moves towards them. That is 2 distinct incidents! How can you not understand this!? Are you under the illusion that somehow these are the same incident and Franks arm magically teleports above or below the Aussie's arm depending on the angle you view from!?

You think I am defending Franks? You missed this bit then, didn't you...

No, you are defending the decision not to punish him.

What I have tried drum into you, so far unsuccessfully, is that NOT EVERY ACT OF FOUL PLAY IS A CITING. Not only that, but WR Regulations do not work on a system of legal precedence the way the Law does, i.e. just because other players (Ashton et al) have been cited for an act that might, superficially, appear similar, it does not necessarily follow that this player must also be cited. Every citing assessment is unique, and is treated individually on its own merits. A player is cited (or not) based solely on what they actually did on the occasion in question. The Citing Commissioner does not consider anything that the player in question might even have done previously, let alone what another player might have done in another match at another time!!!!!

In this case, the Citing Commissioner has seen the ALL of the video evidence and has made his determination based ALL of the evidence available to him, and after seeing ALL of the video evidence, he has determined that what Franks did (while it was very likely to have been illegal foul play) DID NOT MEET HIS CRITERIA FOR A RED CARD

You, ragerancher, on the other hand, are making your determination base on a fraction of the evidence, i.e. you haven seen everything that the CC has seen!!!

I honestly don't know how I can make this easier for you to understand.

And what I've tried to drum into YOU is that a very strict precedent has already been set! Incidents less harsh than his have already resulted in lengthy bans and world rugby felt it was able to retrospectively punish Marler for saying Gypsy boy but somehow is powerless to punish Franks for reckless play? It has been established that having your fingers anywhere near the eye area is a serious offense worthy of a ban of 10 weeks yet Franks has got off with nothing at all. Actually yes the laws DO work on precedent otherwise we have a situation like today where one set of players gets hefty punishment but another gets away with nothing, there needs to be consistency. Also yes citing commissioners DO consider what a player has done in the past! Bad behavior gets longer punishments than good behavior. I can see with a "fraction" of the evidence that it's foul play. It's like seeing every angle on the TMO after you've already clearly seen the grounding, I can clearly see his hands going to the eye area twice and not accidentally, I don't need to see even more when it's already there!

You're the one that fails to under this. There is picture and video evidence of Franks with his fingers in the Aussies eye area on 2 occasions! That is foul play! You keep going on about the front on camera but keep ignore that the front camera and the side camera are showing 2 different instances, they are not 2 angles of the same grab!

 

[Cruz_del_Sur]

Well, I'm talking about a specific rule that says "you will not contact a player around the eyes", and that specifies that all instances WILL BE referred to the judiciary OR some written requirement that the officials must refer it to the judiciary, and the player must appear ... I'm not talking about interpretations here, i'm talking direct instruction, so if such a thing exists in the law WR should be going after SANZAAR and it's officials.

At the very least, there should be some guidelines/directives for the citing commissioner to release evidence as to why the player hasn't been cited.

First, the thing was, in practice, that is how it already worked. Written or not, we all knew hands near the eye area = citation and ban for a couple of weeks. Why did we know this? Because
1) The rules hinted it
2) The ref, citing commissioners, Sanzaar, WR, the lot, applied it that way.

Second, if what you say is the case, then the question becomes why are you (not you, but a lot of your countrymen) talking about it now, that if could have potentially affected a NZ player, and not when it affected players wearing non-new zealand jerseys. It looks just a tad too convenient.
If you are to question the rules, doing so when it just happens to conveniently favour you, makes you look biased, even hypocritical.

When the Galarza incident occurred, the overwhelming majority of nzers here (bar austingtir) just said something along the lines of "rules are rules, end of". Now that if could have affected them we're seeing a disproportionate amount of them finding excuses under the rocks.
I am looking for consistency and i sincerely cannot find it.

 

[ncurd]

It's interesting to look at the history of these topics on the boards.

The Argentine incident was deemed as dem da rules and only really the Argentinian fans argued against it (apart from Austingtir, but he said eye gouging is fine and can't lead to serious injury so his opinion on the matter is immediately discounted by all sane people).

Chris Ashton got 10 weeks and most english said is was harsh but it got him out 6 nations squad so everyone but Ashton fans didn't really complain. Afterall it was consistent application with the above incident so Ashton fans were just a bit sullen about it.

Now Franks has also had 'incidental' contact and everyone is suppose to accept it according to some NZders when they cry foul and incostent application of the laws just because the above two incidents were 'wrong' despite nobody really piping up at the time.


A similar thing happen with disallowing tries at the world cup. When it happened to England in a warm up game against France us english called foul and we were told to lump it. What it consistently applied to Fiji and other teams in the world cup suddenly it was terrible despite the English saying well we got told they were rules when it happened to us, surely this is just consistent application?


Rangerancher I might be wrong but I think the reason why World rugby could intervene in the Marler incident was the incident was cited and they didn't like the boards not-guilty verdict. As Franks hasn't been cited and in turn not be found not-guilty they can't intervene. Madness in my books but I suspect that's why.

 

[smartcooky]

No, you are defending the decision not to punish him.

No, I am not doing that either.

What I am doling is agreeing with the decision of TWO very senior and very experienced rugby officials, that the infringement Franks committed does not pass their red card test. It does not pass mine either. This is not the same as defending a decision not to punish him. Now you can tell yourself its the same if it makes you feel better, but in actual fact, its not.

Citing Commissioners don't punish they cite, i.e. recommend that a player be charges. However, they don't even get to decide the entry level!!!

And what I've tried to drum into YOU is that a very strict precedent has already been set!

And right back at ya with the drumming. It has already been explained to you that there is no such thing as precedent in the way rugby discipline is managed. But it doesn't matter; you will just continue to keep yourself willfully ignorant of the way things are done so that you can preserve your obvious anti-New Zealand bias.

Your choice

Incidents less harsh than his have already resulted in lengthy bans and world rugby felt it was able to retrospectively punish Marler for saying Gypsy boy but somehow is powerless to punish Franks for reckless play? It has been established that having your fingers anywhere near the eye area is a serious offense worthy of a ban of 10 weeks yet Franks has got off with nothing at all. Actually yes the laws DO work on precedent otherwise we have a situation like today where one set of players gets hefty punishment but another gets away with nothing, there needs to be consistency.

No, they don't, and definitely not at the level of Citing procedures.

Also yes citing commissioners DO consider what a player has done in the past! Bad behavior gets longer punishments than good behavior. I can see with a "fraction" of the evidence that it's foul play. It's like seeing every angle on the TMO after you've already clearly seen the grounding, I can clearly see his hands going to the eye area twice and not accidentally, I don't need to see even more when it's already there!

This one paragraph tells me for certain that you really have utterly no clue what you are talking about. If you must insist on willfully refusing to understand everything else I have been telling you, at least do yourself the favour of getting this important fact through your skull....

Citing.....Officers....do.....not.....punish.....players!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! , They only cite players.

The task of punishment lies in the purview of the Judicial Officer, and he is limited in his access to a player's prior record... to wit, HE CATEGORICALLY IS NOT ALLOWED to consider in any way the disciplinary record the player in question until AFTER he has found him guilty... i.e. he cannot use or refer to prior bad acts in order to come to a conclusion regarding the guilt or innocence of the player in question.

You're the one that fails to under this. There is picture and video evidence of Franks with his fingers in the Aussies eye area on 2 occasions! That is foul play!

Yes, it is foul play, but the question is, was it serious enough to warrant a red card. I don't think it was, and nor do two very experience senior officials.

You keep going on about the front on camera but keep ignore that the front camera and the side camera are showing 2 different instances, they are not 2 angles of the same grab!

The footage from the front on view is the same piece of play as the last part of the side view.

Ignore the still frames, they are next to useless as they will almost certainly have been cherry picked by a media jock with an agenda.

 

[Bee]

Can we sum it up to "for pretty everybody outside NZ this was a red card and a citable offense" ?

 

[Ragey Erasmus]

No, I am not doing that either.

What I am doling is agreeing with the decision of TWO very senior and very experienced rugby officials, that the infringement Franks committed does not pass their red card test. It does not pass mine either. This is not the same as defending a decision not to punish him. Now you can tell yourself its the same if it makes you feel better, but in actual fact, its not.

Citing Commissioners don't punish they cite, i.e. recommend that a player be charges. However, they don't even get to decide the entry level!!!

Stop using the argument from authority. Senior officials make wrong decisions all the time so stop using the fact they didn't think it was as an actual argument, it isn't. You keep saying it doesn't pass your red card test yet have not explained just what the threshold is, despite being asked numerous times. Until you are willing to define the threshold, stop saying it doesn't pass it.

And right back at ya with the drumming. It has already been explained to you that there is no such thing as precedent in the way rugby discipline is managed. But it doesn't matter; you will just continue to keep yourself willfully ignorant of the way things are done so that you can preserve your obvious anti-New Zealand bias.

Your choice

De jure there may not be but de facto there really is...

This one paragraph tells me for certain that you really have utterly no clue what you are talking about. If you must insist on willfully refusing to understand everything else I have been telling you, at least do yourself the favour of getting this important fact through your skull....

Citing.....Officers....do.....not.....punish.....players!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! , They only cite players.

The task of punishment lies in the purview of the Judicial Officer, and he is limited in his access to a player's prior record... to wit, HE CATEGORICALLY IS NOT ALLOWED to consider in any way the disciplinary record the player in question until AFTER he has found him guilty... i.e. he cannot use or refer to prior bad acts in order to come to a conclusion regarding the guilt or innocence of the player in question.

Fine, got a technicality wrong but this still doesn't change the fact that Franks has escaped even a citing for an identicla offence that 2 players got banned for. If rugby isn't going to try to apply the rules equally we may as well throw away the rulebook.

Yes, it is foul play, but the question is, was it serious enough to warrant a red card. I don't think it was, and nor do two very experience senior officials.

So for the umpteenth time, what IS serious enough? If repeatedly pushing your hands into a players eye area isn't sufficient then what is? So we need thumbs in eye sockets trying to burst the eyeballs or something?

The footage from the front on view is the same piece of play as the last part of the side view.

Ignore the still frames, they are next to useless as they will almost certainly have been cherry picked by a media jock with an agenda.

One of those still frames was taken by me from the video so way to try to dismiss something by claiming author bias rather than the image itself. It is clear you are going to deny deny deny until it is put right in your face as much as Franks fingers so I'm going to just compile a series of key images from the video and see how you dismiss them.

 

[Groundhog]

Can we sum it up to "for pretty everybody outside NZ this was a red card and a citable offense" ?

Yep pretty much. Better be careful about saying that though because I'll probably be accused of being jealous/ still angry about 2005 as standard.