Brumbies wing loses ban appeal
THE ACT Brumbies’ appeal against Henry Speight’s five-week ban for a dangerous lifting tackle was dismissed yesterday, with the winger set to miss the start of the Rugby Championship.
The 27-year-old Australia international was last week hit with the ban until July 25 after the tackle during the Super 15 qualifier between the Western Stormers and Brumbies.
He missed the Canberra side’s semi-final against the Wellington Hurricanes on Saturday.
The Hurricanes, the runaway Super 15 league leaders, outclassed the Brumbies 29-9 and will face the Otago Highlanders in Wellington this Saturday in the final.
Super Rugby organisers South Africa, New Zealand and Australia Rugby (Sanzar) upheld the ban during the appeal hearing late yesterday, dismissing the Brumbies’ case that the tackle was wrongly classed as a lifting tackle and that the punishment was too severe.
“The committee dismissed the appeal on the basis that the appellant was unable to show that the judicial officer’s central factual findings, that the tackle involved both a lifting and driving, were in error,” Sanzar said in a statement.
“The committee also unanimously dismissed the appeal brought against the five-week (four-match) suspension imposed on Speight. It found that the judicial officer had not erred in principle and that the sanction imposed was not manifestly excessive.”
The suspension means Speight, who is expected to represent Australia in the Rugby Championship, will have to miss the Wallabies’ games against South Africa on July 18 and Argentina on July 25. — AFP THE Border U13 Country Districts team scored their second win of the festival during their second game of the U13 Coca Cola Craven Week at Rob Ferreira High School in White River, Limpopo, yesterday.
This came before the Border U13 Craven Week team crashed to defeat in their second match of the festival against Western Province.
The Border U13s, after their solid win over Limpopo Blue Bulls yesterday found themselves up against the only team to beat them at last year’s Craven Week, Western Province.
Last year it was the festival’s final main game where Border lost their only match, but this year it was the second round of the festival where they were drawn together, and Border unfortunately had no answer to WP as they claimed a strong 330 win in the end.
“If you are drawn against Western Province at the Craven Week you know you are one of the best teams at the tournament because Western Province are usually the best team overall and only play the best,” said Border Schools Rugby Secretary Mongezi Mncono.
WP ran in four tries in a dominant first half to lead 26-0 at the break, and managed to add to their tally with one more try in the second half, despite Border’s improved effort after the break.
The team’s next match will be tomorrow, with their opponent still to be confirmed. Today is a tournament rest day.
In the earlier match the Border U13 Country Districts team continued their impressive U13 Craven Week with another big scalp to make it two from two.
They defeated the Pumas U13 team 19-14 thanks to a fantastic second half turn around, after they had trailed by 14 points at the break.
“The last two years were bad for our Country Districts teams, but this year we knew that they were going to surprise everyone and they have with two fantastic results so far and I expect them to finish the week very well,” said Mncono.
The first half of the match belonged to the Pumas as they scored through J W Mare in the 12th minute and three minutes from half time through Christiaan Van Der Merwe, with Alec Vermaak converting both for a 14-0 lead at the interval.
Border who had themselves received a yellow card early in the first half, were then a man up at the start of the second as the Pumas were given a yellow and Border took advantage of the extra man for Siphe Nonkwenkwe to score in the 28th minute and Mihlali Jika hit the conversion to halve the deficit.
Border continued to dominate even after the return of the yellow-carded player and Siyanda Joja went over in the 32nd minute for an unconverted score to turn it into a two point game.
With four minutes left in the match Nonkwenkwe then scored his second try of the game and converted his own score to put Border 19-14 up, which they then held onto until the end of the match.
On Monday Border Country Districts U13s came back from six-nil down at the half time break to beat the Griffons U13 team 22-16.
Asphe Bhunqane, Nonkwenke, Athenkosi Mutala and Luyanda Dyani all scored tries while Dyani slotted one conversion in the impressive win.