Schoeman sees red over a lack of clarity in the rules
PROP forward Pierre Schoeman arrived at Edinburgh after the shame of being banned for biting an opponent in a game in his native South Africa. He will forever regret his actions that day but doesn’t have the same level of guilt over being sent-off against Leinster just two months after joining the capital club.
Indeed, he believes rugby chiefs need to be more specific about what constitutes a dismissal after he was given his marching orders at the RDS Arena in September.
Schoeman was also banned for four weeks at a disciplinary hearing after leading with his elbow and striking Dan Leavy in the head.
It wasn’t the best start to his time in Scotland, which came off the back of him being banned for six weeks in April for biting Melbourne Rebels’ Richard Hardwick on the stomach while playing for Super Rugby team the Bulls.
Although Rebels captain Tom English alerted the referee to the incident, he was not punished on the field but cited for foul play afterwards and banned after pleading guilty to the offence. In mitigation he apologised for his action – which occurred as he tried to get Hardwick off him after the pair grappled on the floor, once play had moved on.
‘Going back to my time in South Africa, I missed six games for a different incident (biting his opponent),’ said Schoeman. ‘Look, that is the laws of the game, you can’t do that.
‘It is funny now, but it is not funny when you cost your teammates and at the time we had momentum at the club with coach John Mitchell, who is now with England, in charge. There is no place for it.’
Some would argue there is no place for leading with your elbow either, like Schoeman did against Leinster, but he says there has to be clarity over what is a red card offence in that situation and what is not.
‘I have seen 100-plus incidents since then that weren’t even given as an offence,’ he said. ‘If you take last week’s game into consideration (at the Dragons), I got a fist, an elbow and a forearm to the head and I didn’t pass out, so there was no attention and that could have been minimum a yellow card.
‘Look, it is easy to say that rugby has gone soft. I know the concussion protocol and with post-concussion syndrome there has to be more attention paid to the head and neck injuries, but these incidents happen so frequently.
‘If you pause and play the video you can find 50-plus incidents in a match. If you go “slow mo”, how many fists and elbows are there in defence and in attack? There are a lot.
‘The big confusion is, can you fend when you are sweating? You can’t grip a guy on the neck or the collarbone area and if you slip, where must you put your arm?
‘Maybe we should tackle like Owen Farrell without any arms. I mean where should you put your arm if you are carrying? If you run with the ball, does it count if you strike a guy with this elbow then? Where else must you put your elbow? Must you run like this (gestures holding arm tucked down beside body) with your arm?
‘So the guys are a bit scared about that.
‘It is just whether they (referees) catch you or not and for me it is 50-50.
‘It is difficult to always blame the ref because it is also difficult for them because they can’t be looking at 30 players the whole time.’
Such is Schoeman’s importance to Edinburgh, since he returned from his four-week ban, he was rested for the defeat at Munster to keep him fresh for the Heineken Cup match against Newcastle Falcons at Murrayfield next weekend.
A win will give Edinburgh a chance of qualification for the knock-out stages after beating Toulon at home and picking up a losing bonus point in their away defeat at Montpellier.
Schoeman, who missed both those European games because of his ban, believes his club and Glasgow Warriors qualifying for the knockout stages would help the chances of keeping their top players.
‘It’s very important we qualify and it’s a massive thing for the Scottish boys to play in the Champions Cup,’ said the South African.
‘You see it here with Huw Jones at Glasgow. There are only two clubs in Scotland and there’s offers coming from French clubs, Premiership clubs, attracting these boys.
‘There’s a lot of exposure in this competition and it’s going to be difficult to keep someone like Bill Mata in Edinburgh if he doesn’t have aspirations to play for Scotland, which he obviously can’t, so it makes a massive difference meeting with the best in Europe.
‘We’re halfway through the season already, so a loss or win in Europe is going to count immensely.
‘We have Newcastle back to back and have the Scottish boys back as well and experienced leadership in the line out and the set piece which is vital in these games.’