Red card completes Cipriani’s rotten week
A dreadful week for Danny Cipriani, still smarting from his England omission despite an outstanding start to the season with Gloucester, went from bad to worse after he was shown a straight red card less than half an hour into the Champions Cup match against Munster at Thomond Park.
Cipriani was sent off by referee Alexandre Ruiz for making contact with his shoulder to the head of Munster centre Rory Scannell, with Munster going on to win comfortably 36-22.
In the other Pool Two match, Castres No8 Maamu Vaipulu was also shown the red card for a similar offence on Exeter’s Luke Cowan-Dickie, in another example of the stricter rules introduced by World Rugby regarding contact to the head.
However, there were questions over a lack of consistency after a similar incident involving a high tackle by Billy Twelvetrees on Munster’s Joey Carbery resulted in Ruiz awarding only a penalty against Gloucester’s centre.
“My view is simple, it’s spoiling the game if there’s no intent,” said Gloucester head coach Johan Ackermann. “It’s a difficult one to speculate what we would’ve done with 15.
“Danny’s disappointed. If they come and watch how he trains, that’s how he protects himself. It’s a normal habit for him. He didn’t even want to tackle the guy. He wanted to just get out of it.
“If the supporters came to watch 15 versus 14, that’s great. That’s a great way for rugby [to go] forward.”
Elsewhere, Wasps and Bath drew 35-35 in a match where England head coach Eddie Jones was booed when his face was shown on the big screen.
“I would be very disappointed if that [booing] was the case, but I thought it was more in jest than anything, really.” said Wasps head coach Dai Young.
The look of resignation was telling. Danny Cipriani may not have meant to hurt Rory Scannell, but he knew from the moment his shoulder met the Munster centre’s head that the red card was inevitable. He accepted the decision of referee Alexandre Ruiz with a nod of the head and motioned towards Scannell to check he was all right.
As he jogged off, Gloucester’s hopes went with him. The visitors’ late rally of three tries was valiant, but their prospects of coming away from Limerick with a victory were shot once Cipriani had been sent off after 29 minutes. And the decision was met with more scepticism after a similar incident involving a high tackle by Billy Twelvetrees on Munster’s Joey Carbery resulted in Ruiz only awarding a penalty against the Gloucester centre, highlighting the ongoing lack of consistency.
“[The referee] said he felt the shoulder contacted the head. For him that was enough for a red card,” explained Gloucester captain Ed Slater. “He’s the referee. Whether I agree or not doesn’t matter.
“I know player welfare’s thrown out there a lot. There were a few high shots thrown out there during the game. I’m trying to work out what makes that one a lot more serious than the others, but I understand there’s a player welfare issue.”
Historically, Thomond Park has been an unhappy hunting ground for Gloucester – but this was a miserable start, having already lost lock Tom Savage to a questionable yellow card prior to Cipriani seeing red.
The cards wiped out what had been a promising opening 20 minutes for Gloucester, with Munster looking disjointed, summed up best by CJ Stander’s uncharacteristic drop as he loomed down on Cipriani.
With Savage off the field, a run of phases inside Gloucester’s half eventually yielded a score after 20 minutes, as Munster worked the ball right for former Sale full-back Mike Haley to dot down in the far corner.
Gloucester responded positively, with Cipriani knocking over a penalty from long-range, before the gamechanging collision that left the visitors without their fly-half and attacking architect.
Joey Carbery obliged with the resulting penalty and a few minutes later the contest was effectively dead when Munster crashed over off a rolling maul, with Rhys Marshall the man at the tail, to stretch the lead to 15-3.
Munster’s numerical advantage told after the break with Carbery dummying and ghosting his way over for the home side’s third try, with the bonus point try coming after 56 minutes through Sam Arnold.
Andrew Conway made it five for Munster after some soft hands from the impressive Carbery, who went on to win the man of the match award.
However, Gloucester, to their credit, dug deep, with Gerbrandt Grobler scoring against his former club and a well-worked team move ending with Jason Woodward crossing in the corner. Ben Morgan, called up by England during the week, crashed over for the final score of the game – but the result was long gone once Cipriani had departed. Munster ended the match with 13 men after late yellow cards for Arnold and Stephen Archer, but now top Pool Two following Exeter’s defeat at Castres.
Gloucester head coach Johan Ackermann said: “We’re disappointed that we couldn’t get closer to them, but the biggest positive for me is the fact that the players showed a lot of character and a lot of fight to stay in the contest, because it could’ve easily [spiralled] and we could have taken 50, 60 points – but the players were just tremendous, showing fight, and we looked fit and strong in the last 20 minutes.
“It was a tough old day for us at the office. We got one or two things on the decisions against us. There was a line-out close to the try line. We were four in the line-out, they were five, so the assistant obviously didn’t see it, the referee didn’t see it and then they stole the ball.
“We all look to the red card, but there were a lot of other things missed for both sides. We obviously had to deal with Fraser [Balmain] not feeling well so we didn’t play him. That’s credit to the front rowers, who fought through the whole 80 minutes.
“But you look at the way the guys ended the game. It was a fight to the end for our players. They never gave up, and you can’t coach that. That’s a great character to have in a team.”
Scores 5-0 Haley try; 5-3 Cipriani pen; 8-3 Carbery pen; 13-3 Marshall try; 15-3 Carbery con; 20-3 Carbery try; 22-3 Carbery con; 27-3 Arnold try; 29-3 Carbery con; 29-8 Grobler try; 29-10 Twelvetrees con; 34-10 Conway try; 36-10 Carbery con; 36-15 Woodward try; 36-20 Morgan try; 36-22 Twelvetrees con. Munster M Haley (J Hanrahan 68); A Conway, D Goggin, R Scannell (S Arnold 48), D Sweetnam (A Mathewson 48); J Carbery, D Williams; J Cronin (D Kilcoyne 48), R Marshall (K O’Byrne 42), J Ryan (S Archer 59), J Kleyn (B Holland 61), T Beirne, P O’Mahony, T O’Donnell (A Botha 38), C Stander. Gloucester J Woodward; M Banahan, B Twelvetrees, M Atkinson (O Williams 63), T Marshall (T Hudson 45); D Cipriani, C Braley (B Vellacott 53); V Ruskin (C Knight 65), F Marais (H Walker 23), J Hohneck, T Savage, E Slater (G Grobler 53), F Clarke (G Evans 61), J Polledri, B Morgan. Referee Alexandre Ruiz (France).