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"Dumb and stupid": Stade
Francais scrum-half Julien Dupuy
Photo: Michael Paler |
Stade
Francais duo Julien Dupuy and David Attoub have had their
disciplinary hearing for alleged eye-gouging delayed until Friday morning.
The French
pair were unable to get to the Dublin hearing today (Thursday) due to
"unforeseen travel
delays", with ERC
electing to delay the meeting.
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The French pair have already released a
statement of their own via the Stade Francais website, while the club itself
has apologised to Ulster.
“The club deeply regret this
situation,” said a Stade statement. “We envisage taking disciplinary
sanctions against the players despite their citation before an ERC
commission,” it added.
“It is normal that the club penalises
players for actions as dumb and stupid,” said the Dupuy-Attoub statement.
“Again, we apologise to the Ulster players and the club, whom we did not
mean to cause offence. The actions were neither premeditated nor
intentional.
“We want to apologise to our club, our
staff and supporters for the negative image that we have left with these
actions,” it added.
It remains to be seen whether their
swift apologies will hold any sway with the ERC’s disciplinary panel, with
the least the pair can expect being a minimum 12-week ban if found guilty.
That could be lengthened substantially, however, if the panel deems their
actions to have been at the more serious end of the eye-gouging scale.
Dupuy looks to be in the more serious
trouble with television footage showing him twice putting his fingers into
Ferris’ eyes. “I stupidly got riled up, like an idiot. I think my gesture
came from irritation,” he admitted. “The images aren’t really in my favour,
but I really didn’t want to put my fingers in his eyes,” added France’s
number one choice scrum-half.
London Wasps coach Shaun Edwards, for
one, would like to see a far more lengthy ban, with the former rugby league
international describing eye-gouging as “the worst things you can do on a
rugby field”. Edwards said he felt a year-long ban would be appropriate for
the alleged offences.
Brive pair Guillaume Ribes and
Arnaud Méla did make the ERC hearing, although they may wish they hadn't
after both picked up lengthy bans for their parts in last weekend's
ill-disciplined home defeat against London Irish.
Ribes -
who was sent-off in the match - will be sidelined until January 10th after
being cited and found guilty of kicking opponent.
Méla was
also found guilty, this time of punching London Irish hooker Danie Coetzee,
and picked up a seven-week ban. Judicial officer Robert Williams said Méla's
two previous convictions for the same offence had been contributory factors
to the length of the lock's ban. Mela cannot play again until January 31
2010.
At the
same hearing Tommy Bowe, of the Ospreys, escaped suspension despite his
citing for a dangerous tackle being upheld.
Elsewhere
in France the LNR has ratified a club salary cap for Top 14
and ProD2 sides, and amended previous proposals for foreign player
quotas.
The
officially agreed salary cap for Top 14 sides will be
€8m in
2010/11 season - a figure still almost double that of the £4.4m limit on
English clubs in the Guinness Premiership - while the percentage of foreign
players allowed has actually risen from the proposed 50% to 60% - for
2010/11 anyway.
The initial agreement was for 50% of
squads to contain home-grown talent by 2010/11 and that figure to rise to
70% the following season. That has now been changed to say 40% must be
home-grown in 2010/11, 50% in 2011/12 and 60% in 2012/13. That will be seen
as a considerable victory for the big-spending clubs as it conversely means
that up to 40% of any given squad could be made up of non home-grown (i.e.
overseas) players. When squads currently run at 35 or more, that means
around 14 players.
Another
aspect of the tighter financial restrictions is the increase in the amount
clubs must also hold in reserve 2010 onwards, with that figure doubling from
10% to 20%.
