Blood & Mud

On Jerry Flannery's ludicrous ban (with video)

With the debate already raging in the comments here, I thought it best to have a proper post about this. Flannery was banned for six weeks on wednesday for this trip on France's Palisson (and by "trip" I mean "bludgeoning");  a ban which is wholly inadequate.

Our French friends of the blog have been quick to come back following the Attoub discussion to use this as yet more evidence of an anti-French agenda in the corridors of power.  I'm not so sure, it is more about incompetence and inconsistency rather than nationality-based prejudice.

There are some differences between the Flannery case and Dupuy/Attoub:

1) Flannery didn't gouge - On the scale of offences gouging is the most heinous at the minute, the Irishman simply wellied someone with such force that it lifted his victim off the ground.  Of course, in real life this would be Actual Bodily Harm, but on a rugby field it can be dressed up as a "misjudgement".  Utter nonsense, this was a vicious assault with zero justification; Palisson had the ball, and even if he didn't there is a difference between hacking a ball on and executing a manoeuvre akin to something from a Van Damme film.  Watch the video, Flannery had plenty of time to pull out but decided to scythe him down anyway.

2) Flannery was apologetic and owned up at the hearing - In any situation where you are being "tried" for a misdemeanour, owning up and saying you are sorry does shorten your sentence, fact.  It is the same in a court of law as it is in a workplace disciplinary - I spent some time as a full-time Trade Union rep so I have first hand experience of this being the case.  So it is natural that Flannery's confession and contrition would have a more positive effect on the outcome for him, rather than Attoub's "evasiveness" which contributed to his lengthy sanction.  By the way, I refuse to believe, as has been put forward by some, that Attoub's evasiveness was anything to do with a language barrier, he could easily have said to his interpretor, "Tell them I'm very very sorry and that it was stupid and I won't do it again."

Where the authorities have ballsed up here is in drawing distinctions between violent foul play of one sort or another and ranking them, e.g. gouging is worse than punching.  This is the fundamental flaw in their disciplinary approach.  The IRB need to give a very strong line that violent foul play - gouging, punching, stamping and kicking - should be treated as one and the same level of offence and treated accordingly.

Taking into account the offence and then his contrition, Flannery should have had a ban similar to Dupuy's, instead he will miss a few Six Nations matches. More worrying is that the disciplinary committee has told the rugby playing world that you can take a violent foul play action that could cripple someone, but they are not really that arsed about it.

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On Jerry Flannery's ludicrous ban (with video)

With the debate already raging in the comments here, I thought it best to have a proper post about this. Flannery was banned for six weeks on wednesday for this trip on France's Palisson (and by "trip" I mean "bludgeoning");  a ban which is wholly inadequate.

Our French friends of the blog have been quick to come back following the Attoub discussion to use this as yet more evidence of an anti-French agenda in the corridors of power.  I'm not so sure, it is more about incompetence and inconsistency rather than nationality-based prejudice.

There are some differences between the Flannery case and Dupuy/Attoub:

1) Flannery didn't gouge - On the scale of offences gouging is the most heinous at the minute, the Irishman simply wellied someone with such force that it lifted his victim off the ground.  Of course, in real life this would be Actual Bodily Harm, but on a rugby field it can be dressed up as a "misjudgement".  Utter nonsense, this was a vicious assault with zero justification; Palisson had the ball, and even if he didn't there is a difference between hacking a ball on and executing a manoeuvre akin to something from a Van Damme film.  Watch the video, Flannery had plenty of time to pull out but decided to scythe him down anyway.

2) Flannery was apologetic and owned up at the hearing - In any situation where you are being "tried" for a misdemeanour, owning up and saying you are sorry does shorten your sentence, fact.  It is the same in a court of law as it is in a workplace disciplinary - I spent some time as a full-time Trade Union rep so I have first hand experience of this being the case.  So it is natural that Flannery's confession and contrition would have a more positive effect on the outcome for him, rather than Attoub's "evasiveness" which contributed to his lengthy sanction.  By the way, I refuse to believe, as has been put forward by some, that Attoub's evasiveness was anything to do with a language barrier, he could easily have said to his interpretor, "Tell them I'm very very sorry and that it was stupid and I won't do it again."

Where the authorities have ballsed up here is in drawing distinctions between violent foul play of one sort or another and ranking them, e.g. gouging is worse than punching.  This is the fundamental flaw in their disciplinary approach.  The IRB need to give a very strong line that violent foul play - gouging, punching, stamping and kicking - should be treated as one and the same level of offence and treated accordingly.

Taking into account the offence and then his contrition, Flannery should have had a ban similar to Dupuy's, instead he will miss a few Six Nations matches. More worrying is that the disciplinary committee has told the rugby playing world that you can take a violent foul play action that could cripple someone, but they are not really that arsed about it.