CJ Stander accepts some of the responsibility for Peter O’Mahony fall

Jack O'Toole

Ireland number eight CJ Stander has accepted some of the responsibility for Peter O’Mahony’s dangerous fall in Ireland’s third Test win over the Wallabies on Saturday.

O’Mahony was taken out in the air by Australian full-back Israel Folau who was cited for placing his “his left hand on O’Mahony’s chest” after contesting for the ball at a first-half restart as O’Mahony started to come back down.

This clip shows three Folau vs POM aerial competitions from Saturday’s #AUSvIRE match.

#1: nothing in game or after
#2: post match Citing Commissioner’s Warning
#3: yellow card

This will be an interesting hearing. pic.twitter.com/5pmQ5mSuW9

— Andy McGeady (@andymcgeady) June 24, 2018

The Wallabies and Waratahs full-back was cited over the incident in the ninth minute, and was later yellow carded for a similar tackle in the air on O’Mahony later in the half, with citing commissioner Michael O’Leary describing Folau’s actions as ‘strikingly similar’ to the contest for which he was yellow-carded.

Under World Rugby’s Regulation 17.25.3 (b), the combination of the yellow card and post-match citation means the incident must be treated as a red card and will go to a disciplinary hearing.

A date has not been set for the hearing, which will be convened under Judicial Officer Shao Wang in Singapore.

Wallabies winger Dane Haylett-Petty said after the match that Ireland were putting O’Mahony in danger by performing one-man lifts and that rugby should move to outlaw the solo lift.

“Being a player that’s often in the air, you want to be protecting the players but I felt like last night that one-man lift, they’re obviously putting their own player in danger there,” he said.

“Any time there was any sort of contact in the air, he fell pretty badly. So, I feel like if anything we should be getting rid of that.”

Stander admitted that he probably should have done a better job at lifting his Munster and Ireland teammate but that Folau’s athletic ability made retrieving restarts quite challenging.

“It’s a tough one, because I’m the one lifting him and I need to look after him,” Stander told reporters (via The Irish Examiner).

“It’s just that Folau is unbelievable in the air, it’s one of those ones where you need to go back and look at it and he got a yellow card.

“It’s tough, Pete got injured because of it. It’s something we worked on during the week, we knew it was going to come, I could have probably protected him a bit better.”