Sale Sharks Diamond given 18 week ban

[Robert Prosser]

Sale Sharks' Chief Executive Steve Diamond was this evening given an 18-week ban from entering the playing enclosure, technical area, approaching Match Officials and communicating or attempting to communicate directly with Match Officials before, during and after the game on the day of the match.

Diamond was charged by the Rugby Football Union with one count of verbally abusing a match official under RFU Rule 5.12 which covers "conduct prejudicial to the interests of the Union and/or the Game". Mr. Diamond pleaded guilty. Additionally Mr. Diamond will pay £4,000 within 14 days. The ban expires on June 20.

The incident took place at the end of the Aviva Premiership match between London Irish and Sale Sharks on January 8.

The panel was chaired by His Honour Judge Sean Enright and the two panel members were John Brennan and Geoff Payne.

http://www.salesharks.com/RugbyNewsDetail/article/2612518

 

[TRF_Olyy]

It's the right thing to happen, to be fair, however "abusing the match official" is a very strong ***le for what he said.
Essentially he said that Wayne Barnes has/had to be 100% correct when giving the final penalty as it was a match decider, and he thought that Barnes was wrong as no one intentionally wheels a scrum these days, as there's no point, and that the wheeled scrum was due to London Irish driving early.
He then followed it up by saying Barnes was late to the match and didn't speak to Sale pre-game, only Irish, as he didn't have time.

More of a case of "know when to STFU".