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20th October 2018
07:36pm BST
When it comes to his on-field exploits, life has been quite good for Cipriani at Gloucester, and the much maligned ten started well at Thomond Park, kicking a monster penalty as Gloucester hung in after losing a player to a yellow card.
Disaster then struck, as Munster attacked the Gloucester defence, it looked as though Cipriani attempted to step back from a tackle, he was too slow though and in the end caught Arnold clean on the face with his shoulder.
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Intentional or not, by the letter of the law it was a red card and Cipriani had to go. Gloucester down to 14, before the half way point, game over.
Gloucester head coach, Johann Ackermann didn't wish to get into a debate as to whether it was a red card or not, but expressed his disappointment that one mistimed tackle spoiled the entire game.
"I'm not going to get involved in the debate around red cards. My view is simple, it's spoiling the game if there’s no intent, I’m not going to say anymore. "It's not going to change the result. "I've got a lot to say but I'm not going to say it, it s not going to change anything. "Some back-rowers make 25 tackles in a game, one wrong and they say he's got a bad technique. But what about the other 24 that he did great. We can debate this over and over, the biggest thing I say is do we constantly want to see 14 play 15?"According to Ackermann, Cipriani was disappointed with the decision, but has moved on from it. His coach however, was refusing to let it go as he lamented how the red card ruined the game for supporters.
"He's disappointed. He wasn't even wanting to tackle the guy. He wanted to just get out of it. It's done and dusted. "If the supporters pay to come and watch 14 v 15, that’s great. That’s a great way for rugby (going) forward."Ackermann was adamant that Cipriani never intentionally went out to hurt anyone.
"He never wanted to hurt anyone. It's not like Bastareaud did on the floor with the player, digging from behind. We all know the game so there's no doubt that's a red card but surely, there's a lot of factors involved in every tackle and to get every tackle spot on it’s going to be quite difficult."
The Gloucester coach did admit that Munster were good value for their win, but again highlighted some poor refereeing decisions that he felt let his side down.
"At the end of the day Munster were good. They deserved to win. They're a quality side, well coached, they've got quality players and we probably should have done better in that first 10-15 minutes when we had a lot of possession." "It was a tough old day for us at the office. There were one or two decisions. There was a line out close to the try-line which we were four in the line out they were five so the ARs obviously didn’t see it, the ref didn’t see it and then they stole the ball. "So we all looked at the red card but there's a lot of other things that was missed as well, for both sides."
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