IRELAND’S STEPHEN FERRIS has been cleared of a citing charge at a disciplinary hearing in London.
The decision by an independent Six Nations committee means the Ulster man is free to face France in Paris on Saturday night.
Ferris was yellow carded in the final moments of the Six Nations opener with Wales on Sunday afternoon for a dump tackle on Ian Evans. Wales full-back Leigh Halfpenny then kicked the late, winning penalty.
Replays showed that Davies clearly lifted and inverted Ryan before dropping him from a height. A statement from the disciplinary committee today said that the incident “merited a top end entry to the IRB’s table of sanctions.”
Unfortunately this sensible decision does not alter the effect the penalty and sin-binning had on the game on Sunday. On such matters games are won and lost… In this case, a weak decision resulted in a loss….
We lost because we were completely outplayed and not because of a weak decision. Wales were far superior and fully deserving of the win. Blaming the ref is a waste of time. Try looking at some Irish players who missed tackles and just didn’t turn up – I’m looking at you Mr. Darcy.
@Mark – while i agree with the sentiment that the main cause of us losing was our performance as opposed to the ref – the results today strongly indicate what we all knew – which was that Davies should have been red carded and ferris wasn’t a penalty. if both decisions had been made correctly on the pitch then we would most likely have won the game! not saying we deserved to – but we’d have taken it!
This doesn’t mean it wasn’t a penalty.
It means it wasn’t worthy of further punishment with a ban.
It was obviously bad enough for the citing commissioner to refer him the IRB.
@Rob: No, it merely indicates that Ferris’ yellow card was sufficient and no further sanction was necessary. Personally I thought the yellow card was harsh but have no complaints with the penalty.
well if the penalty stands for a tip tackle – then as per their own guidelines they should have banned him. its a bit too FIFA like for my liking but its an automatic card for such an offence – and should have been an automatic ban if they thought it was a tip tackle.
by not banning him at all – they are confirming what most people know – which is that it was a perfectly legal tackle!
According to the IT this evening “the disciplinary panel that heard his case in London found a penalty should never have been awarded by referee Wayne Barnes, according to the Ireland management”. So it sounds like the panel went further than simply saying Ferris had no case to answer with respect to the citation. We’ll have to see what the full statement says.
Stuart Barnes should be banned for poor decisions. Ferris was stupid to even give him to chance to penalise the team. Lack of discipline. Nearly as bad as ferris was chewing gum during the national anthem. No respect. He doesn’t have to sing it but have some respect.
Stuart Barnes is annoying and not always right in how he analyses games! Luckily he doesn’t commentate on or referee 6nations games!
Wayne Barnes on the other hand………
Dave Pearson the linesman is our ref this weekend…. owes us one!
The same old story incompetent and cowardly officials screw our teams when the opposition cant,and they couldnt beat us whatever anyone says about our performance or kidney ,we were going to win until the ref and linesman screwed it up for us ,just like last year and many other years.
I think the speed at which we surrendered over 50 metres of territory suggests we were on to a loser, if it hadn’t been a penalty it would have been a dropped goal. At any level, you cannot afford to stand off your tackles.
As to the comments about Wales being the better team, I would agree to a point that Wales were excellent, and the whole game was superb. I don’t think we were totally outplayed at all, we defended really well, a vital part of a good performance, and at the end of the day (cliche intended), it was a decision, which I still believe to have been an error by Wayne Barnes, that changed the result. Ferris is a hard hitting tackler, and there was no infringement in his tackle, therefore no penalty. Equally, the Spear/Tip tackle by Davies should have resulted in a Red Card, another cop out by Pearson and Barnes….. having said all that, if all games had no controversy what would we have to talk about! Let’s take it out on the French this weekend with another great performance..
Apologies if this is stupid question, but I think Ferris only served a minute or two of the sin bin time before full time – will he have to sit out the start of the France game then?
It’s embarrassing to the sport when decisions like these are missed on the pitch. The game is becoming to soft, and because of this, it will never compete with American Football regarding audience in the US. Say what you like about soccer but remember they already have a huge audience and don’t need to be as protect of their product as world rugby does.
Becoming soft? Because you can’t drop a player on his neck? That is as dull a comment I’ve seen on this thread. Just look at the power of the collisions and the ferocious contest at the breakdown in the modern game. I suspect it’s a long time (if ever) since you played the game.
My comment was directed to the Ferris tackle, this “power of the collisions” you talk about is 90% of the time an illegal act i.e. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=px4DdFR2geo illegal http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_3KFQ6Lkl6M illegal
“Law 10.4 (j) states: ‘Lifting a player from the ground and dropping or driving that player into the ground whilst that player’s feet are still off the ground such that the player’s head and/or upper body come into contact with the ground is dangerous play’.”
For the by stander who watches rugby and has never played the game, scrums for example are completely incomprehensible and just a waste of time, because of the way they’re refereed. I believe the scrum is an art form, lets not let poor officiating destroy the growth of our game.
I’m glad ferris is a happy man. I’m not that happy because I sat through that game and watched the happy man give away a stupid penalty in the last minute of the game.
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Unfortunately this sensible decision does not alter the effect the penalty and sin-binning had on the game on Sunday. On such matters games are won and lost… In this case, a weak decision resulted in a loss….
We lost because we were completely outplayed and not because of a weak decision. Wales were far superior and fully deserving of the win. Blaming the ref is a waste of time. Try looking at some Irish players who missed tackles and just didn’t turn up – I’m looking at you Mr. Darcy.
@Mark – while i agree with the sentiment that the main cause of us losing was our performance as opposed to the ref – the results today strongly indicate what we all knew – which was that Davies should have been red carded and ferris wasn’t a penalty. if both decisions had been made correctly on the pitch then we would most likely have won the game! not saying we deserved to – but we’d have taken it!
This doesn’t mean it wasn’t a penalty.
It means it wasn’t worthy of further punishment with a ban.
It was obviously bad enough for the citing commissioner to refer him the IRB.
@Rob: No, it merely indicates that Ferris’ yellow card was sufficient and no further sanction was necessary. Personally I thought the yellow card was harsh but have no complaints with the penalty.
well if the penalty stands for a tip tackle – then as per their own guidelines they should have banned him. its a bit too FIFA like for my liking but its an automatic card for such an offence – and should have been an automatic ban if they thought it was a tip tackle.
by not banning him at all – they are confirming what most people know – which is that it was a perfectly legal tackle!
According to the IT this evening “the disciplinary panel that heard his case in London found a penalty should never have been awarded by referee Wayne Barnes, according to the Ireland management”. So it sounds like the panel went further than simply saying Ferris had no case to answer with respect to the citation. We’ll have to see what the full statement says.
Well done big man ,justice served ,I wonder can we or should we be allowed to cite referees for their under par performance
Stuart Barnes should be banned for poor decisions. Ferris was stupid to even give him to chance to penalise the team. Lack of discipline. Nearly as bad as ferris was chewing gum during the national anthem. No respect. He doesn’t have to sing it but have some respect.
Stuart Barnes is annoying and not always right in how he analyses games! Luckily he doesn’t commentate on or referee 6nations games!
Wayne Barnes on the other hand………
Dave Pearson the linesman is our ref this weekend…. owes us one!
Well said Shane
Good man Ferris.
What happened happened… we need to use it as motivation for next weeks game against the French.
Let’s hope that Barnes gets what he deserves.
The same old story incompetent and cowardly officials screw our teams when the opposition cant,and they couldnt beat us whatever anyone says about our performance or kidney ,we were going to win until the ref and linesman screwed it up for us ,just like last year and many other years.
I think the speed at which we surrendered over 50 metres of territory suggests we were on to a loser, if it hadn’t been a penalty it would have been a dropped goal. At any level, you cannot afford to stand off your tackles.
@Shauna – No –
As to the comments about Wales being the better team, I would agree to a point that Wales were excellent, and the whole game was superb. I don’t think we were totally outplayed at all, we defended really well, a vital part of a good performance, and at the end of the day (cliche intended), it was a decision, which I still believe to have been an error by Wayne Barnes, that changed the result. Ferris is a hard hitting tackler, and there was no infringement in his tackle, therefore no penalty. Equally, the Spear/Tip tackle by Davies should have resulted in a Red Card, another cop out by Pearson and Barnes….. having said all that, if all games had no controversy what would we have to talk about! Let’s take it out on the French this weekend with another great performance..
Apologies if this is stupid question, but I think Ferris only served a minute or two of the sin bin time before full time – will he have to sit out the start of the France game then?
yep – he wont even be allowed to stand with the teams for the anthems! ;-)
No. Sinbins end at the final whiste.
It’s embarrassing to the sport when decisions like these are missed on the pitch. The game is becoming to soft, and because of this, it will never compete with American Football regarding audience in the US. Say what you like about soccer but remember they already have a huge audience and don’t need to be as protect of their product as world rugby does.
Becoming soft? Because you can’t drop a player on his neck? That is as dull a comment I’ve seen on this thread. Just look at the power of the collisions and the ferocious contest at the breakdown in the modern game. I suspect it’s a long time (if ever) since you played the game.
My comment was directed to the Ferris tackle, this “power of the collisions” you talk about is 90% of the time an illegal act i.e.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=px4DdFR2geo illegal
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_3KFQ6Lkl6M illegal
“Law 10.4 (j) states: ‘Lifting a player from the ground and dropping or driving that player into the ground whilst that player’s feet are still off the ground such that the player’s head and/or upper body come into contact with the ground is dangerous play’.”
For the by stander who watches rugby and has never played the game, scrums for example are completely incomprehensible and just a waste of time, because of the way they’re refereed. I believe the scrum is an art form, lets not let poor officiating destroy the growth of our game.
I’m glad ferris is a happy man. I’m not that happy because I sat through that game and watched the happy man give away a stupid penalty in the last minute of the game.