New Zealand hooker Keven Mealamu has had his ban for headbutting England captain Lewis Moody reduced from four weeks to two weeks, following an appeal hearing on Friday.
That means that although Mealamu will be ruled out of the All Blacks’ internationals against Scotland in Edinburgh on Saturday and Ireland in Dublin next week next week, he will be available for the tour finale against Wales in Cardiff on November 2.
His suspension was reduced after an appeal panel decided he had not intentionally meant to headbutt Moody during the match, which the All Blacks won 26-16.
Mealamu can also play for the Barbarians in their match against world champions South Africa at Twickenham on December 4, having previously been selected for the invitational side.
Hikawera Elliot will make his Test debut in Mealamu’s absence against Scotland at Murrayfield this weekend.
But his ban was reduced after an appeal panel chaired by South Africa’s Peter Ingwersen, together with Robert Williams (Wales) and Jean Noel Couraud (France), decided Mealamu had not acted deliberately.
A statement issued by the appeal committee said that although they upheld the original decision that there had been an act of foul play, having had the opportunity to review the video footage, they concluded the act was not intentional and that it merited a lower end entry point in the IRB list of sanctions.
Effectively, this meant the appeal panel thought the offence was now worth only a maximum ban of four weeks and, because of Mealamu’s record, they reduced it to two just as Crerar had, in his original verdict, reduced the ban from eight weeks to four weeks.
Ridiculous.
What a joke.
I’m disgusted.
So effectively the dishing out of bans is a lottery and the chances of getting cited are a lottery too.
There should be a serious rethink of the citing process and the punishments. There is no consistency.
Hahahahahah!
Why do we ever bother?
ROFLLMFAO!!!
@lostfish (Comment 4) : It’s not a lottery. It depends on who you play for. If it’s the Boks, you’ll pretty much take it nice and hard up the rear. Apologies for the graphics, but it’s the only way to put it.
Oh well. At this rate NZ will probably win the RWC next year.
Seems Div was right after all…
And a Saffa let him off?
@KSA Shark © (Comment 9) : Ironic.
Does KM have a bad record…
@Hertford Highlander (Comment 12) : Come on Kiwi. Out with it.
Shocking but not surprising
His suspension was reduced after an appeal panel decided he had not intentionally meant to headbutt Moody during the match, which the All Blacks won 26-16. What a f¥ck\n& joke! Sorry I just want to jump over you here! Oh no my head accidently hit yours!
@Ben (Comment 15) : It’s a disgrace. Why don’t they just gift the Kiwis the freaking RWC already. This is only the continuation of a one-sided judicial affair where the All Blacks are allowed to do what they want while the rest are punished harshly for what they do.
In this case, aliens no doubt abducted both Mealamu and Lewis Moody and installed magnets in both their heads so that when they were in that specific position, the magnets pulled Mealamu’s head into the back of Moody’s simulating a head-butt.
So it wasn’t really Kevvy’s fault. It was the alien’s.
Pathetic. This is one of the reasons why I’m starting to have a stuff-it feeling toward international rugby.