Wallabies will fight to save 'distraught' Kerevi's tour
NEWS: The Wallabies will battle to ensure Samu Kerevi’s tour isn’t over after the returning centre was left “distraught” by his red card for a dangerous tackle, the one sour note in their record-shattering win over Wales.
As they celebrated their biggest-ever haul of points in a Cardiff Test with the 52-20 thumping, coach Joe Schmidt wasn’t hiding his disappointment that an undeserved punishment should mar Kerevi’s landmark 50th cap in the centre.
Kerevi could likely miss the Scotland Test next weekend at Murrayfield, which would be a significant blow to the Wallabies’ hopes of winning the third leg of their British Isles ‘grand slam’ quest.
The 31-year-old, who is based in Japan, was not expected to be available for the final match of the tour against Ireland in Dublin anyway, so his tour could be over unless Australian officials successfully fight his corner.
Kerevi was shown a yellow card, later upgraded to red, at the start of the second half after his tackle on Jac Morgan ended with his shoulder and forehead crashing into the Welsh flank’s cheek.
Ruled as highly dangerous by the TMO, the decision to upgrade to the 20-minute red didn’t go down well with the Wallabies who felt there were mitigating circumstances, with Morgan having dipped into the collision late and effectively turning it into a ‘high’ tackle.
“We’re pretty disappointed with that decision around Samu, and we’ll have a look at that,” said Schmidt.
“It’s pretty tough for Samu to be sent off in that tackle. He is distraught. Fiftieth game for the Wallabies and he gets a red card.
“He was trying to drop into the tackle, I thought. We were surprised that there was no mitigation, particularly because Jac played on, and there was no ping on his mouthguard, so it was then described as high danger.
“We will look at that closely, and potentially ask some questions through the right channels.”
In another incident, Wallabies’ scrumhalf Nic White was hit high by Ellis Bevan, which looked comparable to the Kerevi hit but ended with no card for the Welsh No.9.
It could have been worse for the Wallabies later after new boy Joseph-Aukuso Suaalii also had a dubious hit on Morgan, but it went unpunished, with the cross-code star, who played just 17 minutes off the bench, now set to be starting in midfield next week in Kerevi’s absence.
Remarkably, the Australians, only narrowly 19-13 ahead when Kerevi was dismissed, were able to make light of being one man down for that entire third quarter as they ran in three of their eight tries, leaving Schmidt and captain-for-the-day Alan Alaalatoa declaring their pride in the team.
“Very proud. It was really special. For us to connect like the way that we did today out there under pressure was massive for our group. And I think we’re going to go a long way from that,” said Alaalatoa.
