Deacon used to be taken out by big fellas all the time, especially after Big Joe (who used to position himself in the way) retired.

Nothing new here.

I assume by that comment you're on about con mikas clash of heads with kyle amor. Speaking as a wakefield fan, I dont think any of us called for Mika to be banned. We all saw the incident as a accidental clash of heads...As everyone did apart from Stevo on fulltime where he said Mika should have been sent off. Each to their own opinion.

As for scruton. for me, the tackle was just a tad on the late side, but as phil clarke pointed out, in real time/at full speed its very difficult for scruton to pull out. Personally im undecided on that. As for the point of contact, it was on obriens shoulder and it was the impact and element of surprise which caused obriens neck to jolt.

Nope, it was Bren being on the Cas board all week acting "impartial" telling us all how Chase deserved a ban because of "protecting the players"

Oh and Chase got banned despite initial contact being legal - Scruton finished with his upper arm/shoulder in O'Briens face and there are pictures proving this too so players can't hide behind that now, not to mention Scruton was late - Clarke also said it was almost as bad as the Bousquet when it happened so he obviously saw it to be a bad one too.

Jake Webster's late hit on Brett Kearney around the 47th minute mark seemed worse. Fortunately for Webster, Sky didn't show a replay of the incident. Kearney clearly suffered though.

Add David Luiz from Chelski Wendyball club to the sinners list - just done a Brentford player the same way. Cheap shot!

I think it was slightly late, it looks a million times worse when you use super slow motion though. Don't think it's worth a ban IMO.

I do hope we don't start going over the top about shoulder charges and foul play. The media seem to be focusing on it and making out it's full of dirty tackles. It's not, there are no more dirty challenges, or any worse challenges than they were 5, 10 o 20 years ago.

So, for "Wakey fans", read Bren???

A bit of a sweeping generalisation there, Gronk!

Talk about a chip on the shoulder/inferiority complex/one-eyed, unsubstantiated opinion.*

*Delete as necessary.

dboy where have you been? I am so happy that you have returned to bless us all with your rapier wit and impartial observations.....

This has always been in our game.

It's up to the officials and the judiciary to ensure 'dirty play' doesn't get rewarded.

As someone who grew up watching the great John Holmes get consistently clattered off the ball by opposition "enforcers", we're in danger out creating a mountain out of a molehill here.

The Bousquets challenge was a bad one, and has been rightly (if leniently) punished. Those kinds of hits are still fairly rare these days though, thankfully.

Ey up Wayne.

Just so amazingly busy at work...you know how it is!

O'Brien is lightweight. Got a little smack later too and was groggy. Was a fair hit. O'Brien is just not big enough yet.

No he didn't. The initial contact was between Chase's shoulder and Hardaker's head, that's why he got banned. Or are you going to make up more stuff to defend Chase's tackling?

Eh?

So, the final ruling is that Scruton's first contact with O'Brien was legal, and that in total it was no more than a Grade A offence, incurring a small fine.

Everyone happy?