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Banned Brad Shields cleared to play again with immediate effect
Brad Shields has been cleared to play for Wasps with immediate effect after his appeal against a four-match ban was successful. The ex-England international was suspended following his red card for a tackle in last Sunday’s Heineken Champions Cup loss to Munster. The sending-off by referee Romain Poite was viewed as very harsh, yet the New Zealander had the red card decision upheld at a disciplinary hearing and was set to miss this weekend’s European game at Toulouse and three Gallagher Premiership matches.
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Wasps were furious with the outcome and their coach Lee Blackett explained on Wednesday at his weekly media conference that they would be appealing the verdict. They were right to do so as Shields was successful in arguing his case, is now free to play again and was named as his team’s skipper for their round two match in France but that fixture was ultimately postponed on Friday because of new travel restrictions brought in by the French government.
An EPCR statement read: “Brad Shields has had his appeal against a four-week suspension upheld following a hearing by video conference before an independent appeal committee on Thursday.
“Shields was sent off by referee Romain Poite during his club’s Heineken Champions Cup round one match against Munster for tackling prop Dave Kilcoyne in a dangerous manner in contravention of law 9.13 and was subsequently suspended by an independent disciplinary committee.
“The independent appeal committee comprising James Dingemans (England) chair, Donal Courtney (Ireland) and Roddy Dunlop (Scotland) considered video imagery of the incident and heard submissions from Shields, from Wasps team manager Dave Bassett, and from EPCR disciplinary officer Liam McTiernan.
Wasps ain't happy with the punishment meted out to the red carded Brad Shields #Wasps #HeinekenChampionsCup #WASvMUN https://t.co/XnPMT4I3Lu
— RugbyPass (@RugbyPass) December 15, 2021
“The appeal committee agreed with the original decision that the red card threshold was passed. However, it decided that the disciplinary committee was wrong to find that there was no on-field mitigation. The appeal committee determined that there was on-field mitigation in that there was a late change in the dynamics of the tackle due to the tackle of another Wasps player, Thomas Young. This reduced the red card to a yellow card for the purposes of World Rugby’s head contact process. Therefore the appeal was upheld, and Shields is free to play.”
“He is desperate to play,” explained Blackett at his Wednesday media briefing. “He probably feels harshly done a little bit but honestly we have not had loads of conversations about it, we were talking about other things. We were hoping we would get a positive result from last night, which we have not and whatever will happen will happen. Brad is the ultimate team man and he was gutted on the day, but he has reacted positively and has been leading out on the field on both training days we have done this week.”
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Shields, who last month spoke at length to RugbyPass about the first-ever red card in his career which he received in September for two yellow-carded maul offences, had his tackle versus Munster ranked as a six-week entry point at his hearing and the fact he contested the charge meant he then didn’t receive the usual 50 per cent mitigation and was banned for four weeks rather than three.
There was mainly surprise that the original decision was a red card, pundits such as Andy Goode calling out the outcome reached by referee Poite, “He is what is known as a cowboy,” said Goode on this week’s Rugby Pod. “He is French, he is an absolute cowboy of a referee, Romain Poite, with that decision to send off Brad Shields with a red card. It is never a red. It doesn’t even make contact with his head for me.”
WASPS (vs Toulouse, Sunday)
15. Zach Kibirige; 14. Francois Hougaard, 13. Josh Bassett, 12. Michael Le Bourgeois, 11. Luke Mehson; 10. Jimmy Gopperth, 9. Sam Wolstenholme; 1. Tom West, 2. Dan Frost, 3. Biyi Alo, 4. Vaea Fifita, 5. Tim Cardall, 6. Brad Shields (capt), 7. Thomas Young, 8. Alfie Barbeary. Reps: 16. Michael van Vuuren, 17. Robin Hislop, 18. Pieter Scholtz 19. Kieran Curran, 20. Nizaam Carr, 21. Will Porter, 22. Rob Miller, 23. Alex McHenry.
Comments on RugbyPass
🤦♂️🤣 who cares who’s the best . All I know is the All Blacks have the star coach but have few star players now …
27 Go to commentsJe suis sûr que Farrell est impatient de jouer avec Lopez et Machenaud et d’être entraîné par Collazo… 🤭
1 Go to commentsAn on field red (aka a full red) in SRP must surely carry a bigger suspension than a red card given by the bunker as that carries a 20 minute team punishment. Had Damon Murphy abdicated his responsibility as a ref and issued both Drua players a yellow, which would have been upgraded to a 20 minute red by the bunker, that would have killed Australia and New Zealand’s push for the 20 minute red to be trialled globally from July this year.
11 Go to commentsEver so often you all post a Danny Care story that isn’t the announcement that he has finally re-signed for one more, victory tour season at Quins and I’m just like, “well you fooled me again!” My absolute favorite player ever, we need to make his final year at the Stoop (and Twickers) official already. I know he supposedly snubbed France but I won’t feel better until he signs.
1 Go to commentslate hit what late hit it wasn’t at all late and can clearly see he was committed before the tackle
1 Go to commentsChristian Lio -Willies 2 try perfomance was a standout. As was captain Scott Barrett. Up front was where the boys won it.They are a great team and players. Fantastic Crusades , you can keep going.
1 Go to commentsI don't know how the locals feel about that? I guess if you call yourselves the Worcester Wasps that might be appease. But really we need more teams in the Premiership in my view so they are not padding it out as they are at the moment. It might curtail so many players going abroad as well
5 Go to commentsNZ 😭😭😭is certainly rivaling England for best whingers cup!😭😭😭 !!!
27 Go to commentsYup. New Zealand won 3 out of 10 world cups played. SA 4 out of 8 attempts 30 Vs 50 per cent.🤔🤔
27 Go to commentsShould've done this years ago. Change Saturday kick off times to around 11am. Up and off and back home before 3pm, limit travel time too. Allows players to actually do something else with their Saturday that's family oriented or being rugby fans they could ‘watch’ pro rugby. Increases crowds etc. How can anyone that enjoys grassroots and pro rugby have to choose between the two on Saturdays?
9 Go to commentsI bet he inspired those supporters just as much.
1 Go to commentsBen Smith Springboks living rent free in his head 😊😂
67 Go to commentsGood to hear he would like to play the game at the highest level, I hadn’t been to sure how much of a motivator that was before now. Sadly he’s probably chosen the rugby club to go to. Try not to worry about all the input about how you should play rugby Joey and just try to emulate what you do on the league field and have fun. You’ll limit your game too much (well not really because he’s a standard athlete like SBW and he’ll still have enough) if you’re trying to make sure you can recycle the ball back etc. On the other hard, you can totally just try and recycle by looking to offload any and everywhere if you’re going to ground 😋
1 Go to commentsThis just proves that theres always a stat and a metric to use to justify your abilities and your success. Ben did it last week by creating an imaginary competition and now you did the same to counter his argument and espouse a new yardstick for success. Why not just use the current one and lets say the Boks have won 4 world cups making them the most successful world cup team. Outside of the world cup the All Blacks are the most successful team winning countless rugby championships and dominating the rankings with high win percentages. Over the last 4 years statistically the Irish are the best having the highest win rate and also having positive records against every tier 1 side. The most successful Northern team in the game has been England with a world cup title and the most six nations titles in history. The AB’s are the most dominant team in history with the highest win rate and 3 world cups. Lets not try to reinvent the wheel. Just be honest about the actual stats and what each team has been good at doing and that will be enough to define their level of success.
27 Go to commentsHow is 7’s played there? I’m surprised 10 or 11 man rugby hasn’t taken off. 7 just doesn’t fit the 15s dynamics (rules n field etc) but these other versions do.
9 Go to commentsPick Swinton at your peril A liability just like JWH from the Roosters Skelton ??? went missing at RWC
14 Go to commentsLike tennis, who have a ranking system, and I believe rugby too, just measure over each period preceding a world cup event who was the longest number one and that would be it. In tennis the number one player frequently is not the grand slam winner. I love and adore the All Blacks since the days of Ian Kirkpatrick when I was a kid in SA. And still do because they are the masters of running rugby and are gentleman on and off the field - in general. And in my opinion they have been the majority of the time the best rugby team in the world.
27 Go to commentsHaving overseas possessions in 2024 is absurd. These Frenchies should have to give the New Caledonians their freedom.
21 Go to commentsBell injured his foot didn’t he? Bring Tupou in he’ll deliver when it counts. Agree mostly but I would switch in the Reds number 8 Harry Wilson for Swinton and move Rob Valentini to 6 instead. Wilson is a clever player who reads the play, you can’t outmuscle the AB’s and Springboks, if you have any chance it’s by playing clever. Same goes for Paisami, he’s a little guy who doesn’t really trouble the likes of De Allende and Jordie Barrett. I’d rather play Carter Gordon at 12 and put Michael Lynagh’s boy at 10. That way you get a BMT type goalkicker at 10 and a playmaker at 12. Anyways, just my two cents as a Bok supporter.
14 Go to commentsThanks Brett, love your articles which are alway pertinent. It’s a difficult topic trying to have a panel adjudicating consistently penalties for red card issues. Many of the mitigating reasons raised are judged subjectively, hence the different outcomes. How to take away subjective opinions?
11 Go to comments