SANZAR and rucking

Lawyers' view

SANZAR, the body which runs rugby played in the Tri-Nations and the Super 14, has a judicial committee. One of its members, Jannie Lubbe, drew our attention to two decisions by SANZAR's judicial committee on the matter of rucking.

The judicial committee has three members – one from each member country, South Africa, New Zealand and Australia, hence the acronym.

Both of these are decisions of hearings by the SANZAR judicial committee last year. Both concern players who had used their boots on opponents. Both findings were made public.

The first case was the hearing of an appeal by Ali Williams against suspension for illegal use of the boot. He had been suspended for six weeks after being ordered off the field "for trampling an opposing player with his boot on several occasions and on one such occasion in the region of the head".

The player's lawyer argued that the player should have been found guilty of illegal rucking which would have carried a lesser sanction than trampling.

The judicial committee, which eventually rejected the appeal, discussed "rucking in relation to the game of rugby".

They summarise their findings as follows:

1. Deliberately using feet on another player with no intention of winning or keeping possession of the ball is not by definition rucking and will amount to stamping or trampling.  A player may be penalised/cited/sent off depending on the circumstances.

2. On the other hand, if a player is rucking for the ball and is doing so in circumstances which are recklessly or patently dangerous as to become guilty of foul play, then, depending on the circumstances, he will be guilty of trampling/stamping or illegal rucking. What distinction is to be drawn will depend on the circumstances of the case under consideration and in particular the nature of the foul play involved.

3. Inadvertent or unintentional contact with players in a ruck as an incident of legitimate rucking for the ball (reckless and patently dangerous rucking apart) on the other hand is legitimate.

The second case concerned Daniel Heenan who had been cited for "stamping on the head of a Crusaders player at a ruck towards the end of the first half of the match".
 
They found as follows: " Following submissions from Heenan’s Counsel, the Disciplinary Committee expressed itself as being satisfied that Heenan had not intentionally stamped or trampled on the Crusaders player but took the view that what occurred amounted to reckless rucking on Heenan’s part as a consequence of which he inadvertently brought his boot, in a single instance only, into contact with the Crusaders player’s head.  The Disciplinary Committee’s decision records what appears to have been a proper concession made by Heenan’s Counsel that the rucking was reckless in the circumstances and illegal under the Laws of the Game.  Reference was made to Law 16.3(f) which prohibits the rucking of players on the ground and the decision of Taylor (23 May 1999) in which the distinction between legitimate and illegal rucking is discussed.  The Disciplinary Committee expressly noted the point made in that case that unintentional contact with players in a ruck arising as an incident of legitimate rucking for the football is not illegal provided the rucking is not otherwise reckless or dangerous.  In the absence of any claim by Counsel that Heenan was thereby prejudiced, the Disciplinary Committee decided to exercise its power to amend the Citing Complaint to allege illegal rucking and being satisfied that illegal rucking had been proved in the sense described, found the citing to have been made out.  Following submissions on penalty Heenan was suspended by the Disciplinary Committee from all Rugby for the period up to and including 1 April 2005."

Heenan appealed.

The first bit of Heenan's case concerned the competence of the citing commissioner to cite in a case of illegal rucking as it forms part of the law on the ruck (Law 16) and so not within the jurisdiction of the citing commissioner whose authority concerns Law 10.

The committee had two reasons to reject this – that reckless rucking could be considered trampling and reckless rucking was an act of bad sportsmanship. Both reasons suggested that the citing was proper.

The appeal was dismissed.