RUGBY IRFU DISCIPLINARY PANEL HEARING:SEAN O'BRIEN and Leinster coach Joe Schmidt may well have breathed a sigh of relief last night when a disciplinary hearing in Belfast last night found the Leinster flanker O'Brien had no case to answer after been cited under law 10.4(1) – allegedly making contact with the eye area of a Benetton Treviso player.
The incident occurred in the 62nd minute of their recent Magners League game in Italy.
The hearing took place in the Ulster Branch offices in Belfast and was chaired by Harry McKibbin and assisted by Stephen Hilditch and Neil Jackson.
The panel heard from the Irish flanker and representatives along with Director of Rugby from Treviso Vittorio Munari (by telephone link).
They all reviewed a recording of the incident in detail before coming to their conclusion.
The panel noted that O’Brien moved his right hand from the collar of the player, Enrico Pavenello, across his face to grab his scrum cap and were satisfied that there had been no deliberate contact with the eye area, no injury whatsoever was sustained and no player reaction was observed.
They concluded that O’Brien was not guilty of the offence and that he is free to continue playing.
The replay clearly shows that although O’Brien did exactly as the panel describes there was no reaction at all from the Treviso player, who was legally hauled back by his scrum cap, and play continued on as usual.
Had he been found guilty of even a minor infringement of the law O’Brien could have been handed a minimum 12-week suspension. His colleague Shane Jennings received that length of suspension when a panel found differently following the first round of a Heineken Cup match involving Leinster and London Irish almost a year ago. Jennings was sidelined despite the London Irish player, Nick Kennedy, admitting that he had over reacted to the incident.
Prior to that Munster flanker Alan Quinlan missed out on what would have been the summer tour of his career with the British and Irish Lions, when he was also suspended for 12 weeks for making contact with the eye area of Leinster captain Leo Cullen during the Heineken Cup semi-final at Croke Park.
What the whole affair will do, if the experiences of Jennings and Quinlan have not already done so, is further educate the players on the perils of even touching other player’s faces during play. While there was no malice at all in O’Brien’s incident the two other players also argued strongly that they, too, were victims of a law that rugby authorities have correctly taken tough measures to uphold.
O’Brien’s innocence means that he will be available for the opening weekend of the Heineken Cup and also available to Declan Kidney for the November series of international matches.
