Moody cited for ‘cheap shot’

Two former Wallaby players have lashed out over an incident that has seen Crusaders prop Joe Moody cited for allegedly striking Kurtley Beale.

Moody made contact with the Waratahs second-five in the 35th minute – just seconds before he scored the Crusaders first try.

Former Wallabies Stephen Hoiles and Rod Kafer were left fuming after the Crusaders came back from 0-29 to win 31-29 at AMI Stadium on Saturday evening.

Speaking on Fox Sports, Hoiles labelled the hit a ‘‘cheap shot’’ while Rod Kafer said: ‘‘that’s a red card offence . . . the guy should not have been on the field.’’

Waratahs coach Daryl Gibson was frustrated the Moody incident – that he labelled as a key moment in the game – was not picked up on-field.

‘‘I thought the Joe Moody incident with the elbow the referees missed, to my book, it’s an elbow to the head, so I’m sure the powers to be will look at that,’’ Gibson said.

On review of the match footage, the Sanzaar citing commissioner deemed the incident met the red card threshold for foul play. The contact felled Beale and opened up an opportunity for Richie Mo’unga, who leapt over the fallen Beale and handed a pass to Moody for the try.

Potential red card aside, if the try had been disallowed, the Crusaders could have easily been down 29-0 at the halftime break.

Gibson’s frustration was compounded by Waratahs players Nick Phipps and Taqele Naiyaravoro being sin-binned during the match.

‘‘A couple of decisions proved really costly,’’ Gibson said. ‘‘The yellow cards . . . there’s obviously a few things that didn’t go our way tonight.’’

Gibson labelled Phipps’ yellow card as understandable but said he would need to watch a replay before commenting on the Naiyaravoro decision.

The Crusaders also felt they were on the wrong end of a couple of questionable calls in the first half.

‘‘There was a couple of calls we thought maybe could have gone our way,’’ Crusaders coach Scott Robertson said.