Byrnes gets 10 Weeks
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BPC
Phil Hardcastle (33)
And did you get to read the transcript and statement or are you just relying on 'hearsay' from your dining partner?
BPC
Phil Hardcastle (33)
By the way, a council is a municipal organisation forming part of the local government tier in our federal system. Counsel is a lawyer, usually in reference to a barrister or advocate.
Bullrush
John Hipwell (52)
I think there does need to be a consequence for making allegations that cannot be proven. I wonder if individuals could be sued for defamation or something similar if they are accused of quite serious allegations that have little to zero proof.
I can see Brynes point....and Blackadder's and the Crusaders.
To have "consequences" defeats the purpose of having a citing system. We need these issues reviewed and being cleared should be enough.
Part of the goal is to clear up the cheap shots at the bottom of rucks that refs have always missed, not create a culture where players won't talk unless they have a known burden of proof. How does that help the situation?
Some false positives is just a consequence of a better system in the long term
Brisbok
Cyril Towers (30)
Of course you can!
If a player feels that there has been deliberate contact with his eye at the bottom of a ruck how will he know, at the time that he makes the allegation, whether or not there will be video evidence of this action taking place?
If the player feels that the incident has occured, he should raise it with his captain who should in turn raise it with the ref and a white card is issued.
As has been mentioned previously, often there may be contact with a players eye that the player feels is deliberate, when in fact there is no intention at all from the opposition player. Has the white card not been introduced to review these incidents? To avoid the defamation issue, perhaps players should avoid specifically accusing a player from the opposition by name unless they feel there definitely will be evidence of this occuring.
Bullrush
John Hipwell (52)
So there should be zero consequences for making false allegations on a players integrity and record?
When you have incidents like the Bulls/Crusaders game on the weekend with players falsely (IMO) accusing the opposition of serious foul play like eye-gouging, we could start getting as bad as soccer with it's diving tactics...
Brisbok
Cyril Towers (30)
Key point being "IMO". I haven't been following this incident as closely as some Crusaders fans have, but did the Bulls players accuse any particular Crusaders player? And has any player had his reputation effected by this? (Serious questions)
Ahh the old 'slippery slope' argument.
To answer your question Bullrush- it depends on the circumstances. In some cases there may be a need to punish players who make false allegations when you can conclusively prove the charge had been fabricated (ie you have footage of the ruck where the gouge occurred, and see the players face for the full duration and nobody comes near it).
However the accuser should not be punished if there is a logical reason why he made the complaint, even though it was found to be false or not enough evidence was found to support it. It seems Chiliboy and Carter both had people's hands make contact with their eyes, but it was shown later these were innocent actions. They didn't know that at the time and were right to pass it up the chain.
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suckerforred
Chilla Wilson (44)
Were the accusatons false? In either case. Unable to be proven is not necessarily the same as false.
In the TC/AB case - TC was sure, and had the scratches to 'prove' it, that there had been contact with his face. It was then found, after a long process, that said contact was accidential. This is an assumption on my part, but is my understanding of the incident and subsequent fall out.
In the Bulls/Crusaders incident - I am not really sure of what has happened but I believe that a couple of Bulls players made complaints that contact had been made with their face - one hopes that they were sure of this when they made the complaints. Judicary has since reviewed the game and decided that there was not enough evidence to support the charge, or determine the culpret.
In both cases, if the Plaintif felt that they had/have a just cause to complain then they should be allowed, even encouraged, to make the complaint without fear of retribution. Said retribution would include being called a liar by the defendant.
Just put yourself in their shoes - you were at the bottom of a ruck and felt a hand cross you eyes, you feel that it is deliberate and make the fact known to your captain and the ref, subsequent investigations show that there is not enough proof as to which player put their hand near your eyes or that the incident was deliberate. Would you appologise to the team/player that you made the accusation against? I am guessing that 90% of the time the answer would be no.
Yes you can destroy a players career by making an accusation of foul play, but you can also destroy a players life by sticking your fingers in their eyes and blinding them. Which one is better?
In the TC/AB case - TC was sure, and had the scratches to 'prove' it, that there had been contact with his face. It was then found, after a long process, that said contact was accidential. This is an assumption on my part, but is my understanding of the incident and subsequent fall out.
In the Bulls/Crusaders incident - I am not really sure of what has happened but I believe that a couple of Bulls players made complaints that contact had been made with their face - one hopes that they were sure of this when they made the complaints. Judicary has since reviewed the game and decided that there was not enough evidence to support the charge, or determine the culpret.
In both cases, if the Plaintif felt that they had/have a just cause to complain then they should be allowed, even encouraged, to make the complaint without fear of retribution. Said retribution would include being called a liar by the defendant.
Just put yourself in their shoes - you were at the bottom of a ruck and felt a hand cross you eyes, you feel that it is deliberate and make the fact known to your captain and the ref, subsequent investigations show that there is not enough proof as to which player put their hand near your eyes or that the incident was deliberate. Would you appologise to the team/player that you made the accusation against? I am guessing that 90% of the time the answer would be no.
Yes you can destroy a players career by making an accusation of foul play, but you can also destroy a players life by sticking your fingers in their eyes and blinding them. Which one is better?
There are somewhat different, one tags an incident for review after the game, the other is to get a penalty or a send off.
Scenario - player at the bottom of a ruck gets seriously eye-gouged, but cannot see who did it. Ends up injured, misses games.
Because he cannot positively, 100% accurately identify the culprit he should say nothing to anyone, lest he be accused of false allegations? What a load of rot.
Or, he brings it to ref's attention, white card issued but video cannot definitely see the culprit. No action is taken against an individual. Is his allegation false, just because the culprit gets away with it? No. His eye would still be injured. Better that he shut up and protect the sanctity of the ruck than point out something wrong going on? That seems to be your point.
The point is making sure possible examples of foul play are policed. If the citation turns out to show nothing, then the case is closed. Calling for action against players reporting things that result in no penalties / bans, and apologies is precious crap of the highest order.
Dan54
Tim Horan (67)
Not sure if allegations are false or whatever, the only thing that has me perplexed is that noone has shown a pic of any damage, and there seems to be no evidence at all. If there was contact made with someone's eyes, and the Bulls thought it was on purpose they should make sure ALL evidence is bought forward to stamp it out of game. If a Crusader's player did not deliberately gouge his eyes it is a false allegation. I agree Cyclo exactly what you say, but as you said his eye would still be injured, does noone think it strange we haven't even seen a pic of said injury?? Also I add that if he got an accidental poke in eye at bottom of ruck, and then claim an eye gouge without knowing who's finger it was, could it not be one of his own teammates? I agree with reporting things, but what has happened here is that an allegation has been made against no player, there is no evidence, but Crusaders now have the cloud of gougers hanging over the whole team. So no I do not know answer, but I would suggest when an allegation is made, there should be some attempt to get a little evidence, even showing a ref the marks, or better getting doc on to do it.
Brisbok
Cyril Towers (30)
Hawko
Tony Shaw (54)
The legal system for years has had a massive problem with "not proven to be guilty = innocent". Right now the bias in the system is towards the notion that not proven guilty = innocent, which means that all sorts of guilty people get off for all sorts of reasons and then want to sue someone for their loss of reputation. If we are to immediately assume that everyone who appears at a hearing and found not guilty is actually innocent we may as well do away with white cards all together.
There is incontrovertible evidence that Carter's eye was damaged in the incident. The appeal found that there was not enough evidence to find that Byrnes gouged it. But the eye was still damaged, it still happened. Same with the Bulls-Crusaders incident. Two Bulls players reported that they were injured at the bottom of a ruck to their eyes. There was not enough evidence to a suitable standard to prove that any Saders player gouged a Bulls player. But that is NOT the same thing as saying the Bulls players made up the story and should apologise. To go down that road gets you to where we are with the legal system today, and that's not a pleasant place.
Complainants and witnesses have to be protected, as well as the accused. When a judiciary hearing says that there is insufficient evidence to uphold a complaint this does not mean the compainants were lying. It means exactly what it said. There is insufficient evidenceto uphold the complaint. No one has to apologise for raising it.
Do you really think the Crusaders are labelled as "Gougers" in the eyes (sic) of the world now? I don't think so. Anyone who has followed the case can see the process. Of course, a players could get accidentally poked in the eye in a ruck. Having been both poked in the eye playing footy, and gouged playing footy I would recommend neither as much fun. The poke was obvious - a guy joining a maul, I almost saw it coming. The gouge was also obvious. He wasn't cited, but I was penalised for attempting to punch him in the head. I claim lack of binocular vision as my excuse for missing!
But, if you don't see it coming, I would recommend making it known.
Bullrush
John Hipwell (52)
There is little to suggest that either Chiliboy or van der Merwe had any deliberate attempts to have their eyes gouged. While no individual player has been effected, I ask if that is the mark that we set to say if this an acceptable behaviour? Do we wait until a players reputation has been wrongly questioned - possibly dragging his name thru the mud and costing him possible future earnings (as per Bryne's point) before we say that it's not OK to make false accusations?
This is from the SMH and I agree with Blackadder.
This is from the SMH and I agree with Blackadder.
Brisbok
Cyril Towers (30)
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