Haskell gets three weeks suspension

Ex Keo

James Haskell has been suspended for three weeks for punching during the Highlanders’ match against the Cheetahs.

The loose forward was yellow carded for the offence during the game but a review of the incident saw him gain a steaper punishment from judicial officer Mike Heron. Haskell’s suspension sees him miss all matches up until and including the weekend of 19 May.

Haskell’s guilty plea, remorse shown and his impressive disciplinary record were factors in his sentence being reduced from five to three weeks, Heron said.

So the crime was worth five weeks . Surely worth a red?

Yeah, its not unlike when thumb in your eye burger only got a yellow for eye gouging a Lions player or when Bakkies recieved NO in game sanction for headbutting Jimmy Cowan. You okes have had your fair share of lucky breaks so I wouldnt moan too much.

@nuke. Burger was red-carded in the game and suspended afterwards.

Nousfreekiwi ....get your facts straight.

but nukefreekiwi does have a point with bakkies headbutt, he continued to play and was only suspended afterwards. 9 week ban if i remeber correctly, ,meaning SANZAR thought his cowardly attack was more vicious.

@Ceradyne Re; 

" Burger was red-carded in the game and suspended afterwards"

 Sorry but you're seriously mistaken. Burger only got a yellow card for eye gouging Luke Fitzgerald  thanks to the fortuitous recommendation by AR Bryce Lawrence.  If you've got contrary evidence,  please post it for public scrutiny and I'll humbly admit my error. Thankfully, I know Im right so dont go holding your breathe waiting for an apology.

 http://www.lionsrugby.com/news/8350.php

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/rugbyunion/international/britishandirishlionsrugby/5723637/Lions-2009-Schalk-Burger-refuses-to-apologise-to-Luke-Fitzgerald-for-eye-gouge.html

.....and for the literary/mentally/psychologically challenged forum members (mozart et al), here is a link to a pictorial representation (video) of the aforementioned incident.  

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6AjnmPNOn6g&feature=related

LoL @ Mozart for buying into Ceradynes misinformed post as though it were gospel truth. What a lemming. Why must a Kiwi school you okes on your own rugby history?

@sasukechiha. Yeah, that Bakkies headbut was in the first few minutes of the game. Bakkies was eventually yellow carded in that match but that was for a completely different offence. Repeated infringing at the ruck whilst under pressure on their own tryline.

Actually nousfree I was commenting on your use of "only" got a yellow", when Burger in fact received a long suspension. But on reading your piece again, it appears you were commenting on in game sanctions. So I got it wrong ....my apologies.

Now here is the essence of the problem. Nobody denies there can be mistakes both ways. But to illustrate if 1 mistake is made one way and 10 the other way please dont talk of level playing fields!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Dont talk as windpomp did that Bryce Lawrence made errors both ways. That is just twisitng it.

Again I ask how many punches can a nz palyer throw before he gets a red. Isn't two more than enough? Again I ask would a nz ref let a SA player off like this - after the touch judge had recommended a red? Please lets keep it real!

Beeny ya need to toughen up abit mate, it's not tiddlywinks- or go play soccer

@mozart. cheers man. Respect!  It actually caught me offguard and was a little disarming to see a SA'n forum member admit his mistake and take steps to ammend the error. Kudos to you Mozart!

How about us admitting to the  display of Craig Joubert in the final  - full marks to all involved in that! Shows how intrinsically honest most Saffers are. How sad is the contrast with the kiwis.

Nevertheless by rubbing shoulders with honest men  they might just improve? Chances are slim must one has to live in hope.

We labour on

@Nuke. My bad Nuke. I for some reason seemed to recall that he got a red card.

Ou Beenbal, you are very loudmouthed about my so-called support for Bryce Lawrence, because you know that it is impossible to post all the discussions about the issue on here, because it would mean copying and pasting posts from forums on another site. You clearly also do not understand that a referee does not have a little score sheet in his pocket to keep tabs on the number of penalties that he dishes out, so that he can make sure that each team gets the same number of penalties.

Bryce Lawrence was not dropped from the International panel of IRB referees because he screwed SA out of the RWC. He was dropped because of all the mistakes he made during the RWC,and poor decisions. He was not dropped to please all us Saffers who were pissed off because we did not make it further than the QF's. I still do not believe that any ref would go out on the field and put his reputation and income at risk by deliberately screwing a team out of a game or a competition.

As far as the RWC is concerened, I will once again, and for the last time, give you my opinion. There was no way that either SA or Aus were going to be in the final. None of the two teams would have beaten the AB's after the QF between SA and Aus. The competition schedule sorted that out. The QF has, IMO, taken too much out of both of the teams to beat the AB's, the following week in the SF. The French are a team who can run on and beat any team on any given day, and they landed in the final due to other teams slipping up, and did not really deserve to be in the final. My opinion again.  I am sure that the AB's underestimated them and if they had to play Wales, for instance, they would have aproached the final with a different intencity and Wales would not have been all over them like the French were. Having said that, let's look at another scenario. Suppose SA beat Aus and NZ and reached the final and were beaten by France, would you really have felt that they would have deserved it, after being beaten twice in the pool stages?

Lunatic can you see now why I call him windpomp.

"There was no way that either SA or Aus were going to be in the final. None of the two teams would have beaten the AB's after the QF between SA and Aus". Bwahahahahahahahahahaha hilarious stuff windpomp. Given we were say 20 to 30 points better than oz and given how poor the abs were I suggest the abs were hugely concerned and hence the BL display - widely agreed as one of the worst ever seen at this level.

Dont try and dodge the issue - the main reason BL was dumped was his atrocious ref display in the Bok/Oz match. What a twister!!!!!!

The match againt Oz was an easy one as we were so dominant so dont talk complete twaddle about somuch being take out of us.!

Please windpomp do not compound matters by denying you said BL made mistakes both ways - implying that there was no bias! Or your saying it was not the refs fault we gave away the penalty that O'Connor nailed to sink us. You call that a fair assessment of events!!! No windpomp that is a twisting of events.

Hahahhahahahahahaha you might not believe it 9ref wouldscrew a side andruin his reputation) but thats what happened. Explain why BL was nz ref of the year windpomp and subsequently dumped by the IRB from the elite refs panel.Explain how an experienced ref suddenly imploded this way!

Ooooh my aching sides!!! Hahahhahahahahahahahahahahaha

We were not 20 to 30 points better than Aus, because we could not finish off the flippin play to score those points. We knocked balls with an open try line, we took wrong decisions at crunch times, etc etc etc. He was not dropped because of the SA/Aus game. That was the final straw for him yes, but his entire RWC was a shambles. He stuffed up the Aus/Iraland game as well.

I am not going to deny what I said about Lawrence, in fact I am going to reitterate it. He made mistakes both ways. What I have not said is that he has made an equal number of mistakes both ways, but then again, I have also said many times a ref is not assessed on how equal his distribution of penalties, etc is.

Had we really been 20-30 points better we would have won the match, despite Lawrence. The fact that we had 70% of the possession means zip if you stuff up the opportunities arising from it. Stupid mistakes cost us just as much as Lawrence's poor reffing. Add to that the gruelling game that we had against Aus, and then having to play NZ, who had their last game against Argentina who they beat by 33-10 "op 'n draffie" as they say in Afrikaans. Remember also that we had our last game before the QF against Samoa and that was very physical and no easy game either.

@Nukefreekiwi........truth to tell there is a bit of argie bargie, but we very much like having you Kiwi chaps on board. Thanks for the nice sentiments.

Well said Moz - my feelings exactly as expressed in my post "Hats off to the kiwis".