Having watched it a couple of times, it isn’t clear to me whether it was Lineham’s shoulder or upper arm that made contact with Grace’s head. I wonder, therefore, whether it was impossible for the video ref to make a judgement without several/many more reviews hence the decision merely to award the extra penalty and place the incident on report. Certainly, Grace wasn't initially aware of the hit and that probably also influenced the decision whereas had be been hurt and stayed on the ground there may have been a card. Nevertheless, I’d hope that there is a ban as Lineham clearly went in late with intent to hurt.
Spot on. Lineham swung a clenched fist and only his own momentum carried this past the target, resulting in a shoulder hitting Grace instead. Watching it back, Lineham is nowhere near trying to make a tackle as Grace dives to touch down, he dives on Grace with malicious intent after the try. nasty cheap shot.
Whilst we're on about cheap shots, what about the cannonball tackle on Fafita during the Wakey match? He's made his feelings known on social media. Sounds like the Pies were up their old tricks last night.
The great thing about Grace's try was his composure which comes with experience and confidence. After making the break he slowed down and used the change of pace combined with the sidestep to evade his pursuers. Previously he'd have given it full gas and run out of momentum. Great effort. Hunte and Sullivanesque.
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Sky glossed over it but Eddie did say Regan did not make anything of it and that may have influenced the decision, he cops some serious head trauma but never seems to complain.
Lineham is turning into a devious player, was he the one running in last year on Barba? Let`s wait and see what the disciplinary do with it.
Given that they said Mike Coopers was only a yellow as his first wasnt clenched, I could not believe a clenched first followed by shoulder contact direct to the head of a player not even looking at the "challenger" didn't result in a red. If Grace stays down he gets sent. And we wonder why players took to play acting
Regan Grace was terrific in the game on Friday and his try was a real crowd pleaser. The noise from the crowd as he ran free was amazing. I was out of my seat and jumping up and down like a kid, egging him on. He also caught a couple of balls kicked above his head in quite an athletic fashion which was encouraging. He seems to get better at catching kicks as the season goes on. He's such an endearing character too that I do hope he continues developing as he is doing.
Must imagine all the faux pain players have when theyve been staying down last season for crusher tackles. Strangely despite numerous this season, players know they cant get a penalty and a yellow card as video refs wont review now so they get up and crack on. Had grace have stayed down, he would have walked is more my point though, the injury outcome shouldn't determine the punishment is also my point
I've often thought that intent is just as bad, so a player going in with a swinging arm who misses gets away with it but a lose arm catches the head without intent gets done
I guess it's hard to manage that though
Just because Grace jumped up shouldn't affect the decision, but imo we should just get on with it, I don't think it's as bad as some are making out
I agree - I think by the look on his face on the slow motion footage he looks like he was about to really lamp him one but fortunately for him and Regan he thought better of it at the last second. It was still a penalty though because unnecessary contact to the head was made.
Wouldn't surprise if the disciplinary make this a lenient outcome on the intent, Lineham will obviously will explain the premeditated swinging arm was a determination to dislodge the ball even though it was far too late, they will also consider Saints got an 8 point score and no injury to Grace.
Didn't Lineham put on elbow on Barba's head last season and the disciplinary was lenient on that one as well.
I think he meant to make contact with the fist and either missed or pulled out, but that said he did make heavy contact with his shoulder to the head and that tends to be viewed quite dimly too these days. He might argue that it was ultimately unintentional but it wouldn’t have taken place without the lateness of the initial challenge
Yeah a player swinging with a clenched fist on a defenseless player that has relaxed as he is scoring and actually contacts him direct to the head with the shoulder, diving in with force and intent isn't bad at all.
You say intent is just as bad then defend clear intent to injure. It was an absolutely vile attempt of a piece of play. How anyone can attempt to defend that is beyond me. Grace was very fortunate that Lineham didn't fully catch him plumb on
There's a problem using slow mo as it doesn't always give a true reflection
Going in with the knees is a common one.
If you run after a player, they are going to ground you naturally drop your legs to get lower, if the timings out you end up going in with your knees, I've done it a coup,e of times playing and each time it was defiantly without intent but didn't look great, I guess it would look even worse on slow mo.
Each time the tackled player just got on with it whilst others ran in, proving to me that things can look worse than the people involved think they are, I haven't seen this back from live view but I suspect this may be one of those times
He definitely just missed. He's a thug and not a very cultured one at that. You could see from the angry gurn he did and pulling the arm back, the closed fist and the fact he didn't aim it anywhere near the ball. He swung to punch him in the face, followed through with it as well, just missed the target slightly because of his timing and the speed they were both moving. If Grace stays down there like most players would have done, he'd be looking at a long ban. Grace's reaction will no doubt get him off with a 1 game ban or a warning, but if he did that to Tomkins or someone of that ilk, they would have stayed down for 20 minutes to get him sent off.
On Grace himself, pleasing to see such a high quality performance throughout the game, not just the showpiece try. Dealing with the contested high balls so well in the first half clearly gave him so much confidence. It's a good trait of a player that his best games have all seemed to be in big games.
His best game so far this season.Showing improvement in all areas this season.
Lineham is a fat lump.
Learned comment from The Don