Quote Saddened!="Saddened!"It's a non issue. A shoulder charge done right is a brilliant thing to watch. Puletua's wasn't even a penalty, he just stood his ground and physically dominated his opponent. There was no evidence at all on the replays they showed on Sky that there was contact with the head and if there was it certainly wasn't Puletua's fault as he didn't jump into it, raise his elbow or dip the shoulder to attack the head.
It just makes me laugh how Ed & Steve were all up in arms about it. The same people who whooped and cheered when countless other players did it in the past. The likes of SBW, Burgess and Morley have made careers out of this style of tackling.'"
Shoulder charges are awesome to see - when done properly. It's perfectly possible to smash a guy with a shoulder charge without making contact to the head.
TP's shoulder charge DID make contact with the Catalan's player's head, it was clear to see on the replay so I'm not sure wtf you were watching.
The reason why general high tackles are normally just penalised with a pen as opposed to a red in this case is that a shoulder charge can never be accidental or just an instinctive grab at a player. TP knew the guy was coming and lined him up for it. He got the point of contact wrong and paid the price.
It was a consistent decision as we had seen previously in the season with Sam Moa. Consistency from referees is all you can hope for most of the time.