I have always been a proponent of VRs being able to review such incidents live during the game.
In this case though, it's up to the officials to see these things.

Both propositions are an ideal world situation though - in a disciplinary hearing you have the benefit of distance from the event, isolation from what has gone on in the game as a whole and the benefit of several opinions as well as (and probably just as important), legal submissions and the submission of evidence/expression of remorse from the players involved as well as consideration of previous record.

You can't squeeze all of that into a video van and come up with an instant and robust conviction can you and even if you could you would leave the code(s) open to potential legal responses afterwards.

Personally I don't expect a referee to be able to spot off-the ball incidents, I expect him to follow the play, maybe theres a case for the assistants to be watching the wider picture but in RL we see so many times how a referee (some more than others) will be very reticent to use his assistants in any other roll than to mark where a ball went into touch.

And if they don't see them as they are behind play like this one should the officials face long bans for not seeing them, like Gotcha says?

A long ban for not seeing something that happened behind him?

Don't be so bloody silly.

Some people talk out of it, maybe we should expect referees to see out of their a[irs[/ies ?

at least one of the officials did see the incident though, otherwise why were the yellow cards produced

I was gonna say the same.

3 punches like that, especially the third, I'd suggest most people would be on the floor after that. You can see how much of his weight Tuilangi puts into it. My uncle is a boxing coach and he's always said to me that the sign of a real good kid in the class is the ability to take a punch far more than it is to give one. You can improve strength, and punching technique with practice, but a natural ability to stay on your feet when somebody is smacking you in the head certainly helps!

Stop stating the bloody obvious here.

Wheels did his usual bunny hop into the dirty stuff without thinking, and McLaren latched on to the support.

The fact you saw the obvious without emotion is irrelevant.

bill shankley was once having a go after a game at referee jack taylor for missing something. i'm sorry, taylor said, my mind was on an operation i,m having next week.
hope it's not serious said shanks.
no, said taylor, i,m having eyes put in my f**king

He saw his version of events from approx 30/40 feet away, what he thought he saw was retaliation and a punch swung by Ashton whereas in fact it was Ashton raising his arm to defend himself presumably against another punch. The TJ saw enough to tell the ref to yellow card both players for throwing punches, he presumably did not see enough detail to stand Tuilangi in the dock and try him for a vicious assault.

In the real world thats what happens, maybe the TJ was distracted by the ongoing play, RU does not have convenient breaks in open play - thats the real world and thats why such incidents are often dealt with by the discipline committee and why the match officials cannot be held responsible for every action that takes place on the field within the 80 minutes of play, they do their best - how many "On Report" incidences do we have in SL every week ?

In Gotcha's La-La land of kneejerkery its always the referees fault and Gotcha can always do a better job what with the power of the eyes in the [iar[/ise.

Emotion? I couldn't care less if Tuilagi got 12 months or 12 days.

The lino (from 40ish yards away), saw Ashton raise his arms out of the corner of his eye, and Tuilagi retaliate in kind.

A yellow each is fine based on what the one official saw, and the disciplinary board took further action as they saw fit.

I'm not quite sure how the referee deserves a long ban after following standard procedure to the tee (which has served both codes of the game just fine up until your little hissy fit).

You Gotcha, as ever did your usual little bunny hop into the dirty stuff not without thinking, but with a huge knee-jerking amount of tedness.

I can understand the ref being unsighted because he was following the ball, but IMO there was no excuse to the Touch Judge. He should have seen but failed to make the correct call. Even if he thought Ashton had thrown a punch, he still should have recommended to the ref a red card for Tuilango for that brutal OTT third punch. Certainly the TJ should face a charge of gross incompetence.

No, the one brought up as a daughter, Olotuli, is an absolute leviathan. He is bigger than Manu and Alesana put together. About half again as big as Henry.

You see him shopping in Leicester occasionally. It takes a lot to put Martin Johnson in the shade, but he does it, well.

Good god there's some over-reaction on this thread. It was a punch up, was it any worse than the Fielden/Peacock v Mason? Or even Brent Webb v Richard Moore?

The fact that Tuilagi managed to land a good punch means he should be punished more than those who are cr@p at punching?

As has been said it's similar to the Fielden v Mason incident in that the soft little white boy pushed the big nasty foreign man away, who being a bit tougher assumed that it was an attempted punch and so the big nasty foreign man proceeded to knock seven shades out of the soft little white boy.

These are professional players getting paid well. If there's a bit of fisticuffs then so be it. It wasn't some cowardly attack when the other player's back was turned, or the disgraceful habit in Union of raking or stamping on people on the floor, or eye-gouging which seems more prevalent in Union for some reason. It was a punch-up, 1-on-1.

A ban, yes. 5 weeks is probably about right. In League I'd expect about a 3 game ban.

Also to the people who are blaming the officials, I'm assuming they haven't done much officiating. Try just getting a knock-on call correct from 10m away nevermind as to who punched who first from 40m away.

100% agree. It was a bit of biff on the rugby pitch ffs! It doesn't matter how brutal the punches looked, the same things happens a dozen times per season in league. When players fight they intend to connect so sweetly as Tuilangi did, whether or not they come off is irrelevant, the intention is there. Ashton got involved in the confrontation by shoving Tuilangi therefore opening yourself up to a bit of biff. I don't know what all the fuss is about tbh...