Citing madness

The citing system in rugby matches is under criticism again, quite rightly IMO.

If you're reading this, you probably know the system is there to pick up dangerous play and serious infringements, primarily, but not solely (despite its initial statement of use), those missed by the referee. Nowadays it includes dangerous play felt not to be suitably punished at the time.

Saturday produced a trip (2 weeks), a number of high tackles (variably dealt with between nothing and 4 weeks). Brian Lima's hit on Pretorius was, frankly, shocking, even for "The Chiropractor" it looked high and dangerous. He may have escaped citing because he knocked himself out, but it's hard to see why he wasn't cited and banned.

Vickery's trip - he alleges was instinctive and not cynical. I'm unconvinced, lashing out with a foot is always hard to do, and he lashed out a long way, it's not like a trailing leg, only got him 2 weeks. Trips, particular kick-trips like that one, are good ways to break legs, arms and potentially head injuries. By their very nature they're unexpected and throw you off balance. You'd hope an international rugby player is sufficiently co-ordinated to land well, but it's not always easy when you running at full pelt and thrown so badly off balance so unexpectedly.

Burger's suspension is outrageous. I think the penalty was probably right - hitting people in the head is something we need to strongly discourage, but 4 weeks would be about right for someone that had jumped in to smack someone in the head, watching the replay it still looks to me like Burger leapt for the ball and missed - clumsy, but not penalisable. He carried through - it's hard to shift momentum when you're in the air after all, and hit the Samoan in the head. Could he have missed the head? Probably (not certainly, and if he'd lowered his arm to hit him in the chest if possible it would still have been hitting a man in the air), but, that "probably could have missed the head" warrants a penalty to my mind.

What is going on with the system? I have moderately little sympathy with "MacCaw gets away with murder" but I certainly have some sympathy that it appears Burger has been harshly treated, and it often seems the Bok players are harshly treated.