Is it time to introduce a lifetime ban for eye gouging after two more players lost...

[Drew1080]

...sight in one eye? Gavin Quinnell and Clarence Harding are the latest to lose their sight after being gouged. Will it take a big name to go blind before it's dealt with properly?

 

[Andrew]

I don't know about a lifetime ban, I think it's pretty severe to end someone's career over something that could easily be an overreaction in the heat of the moment (please note I do NOT condone eye gouging, but people do strange things when they are under pressure).

I definitely support heavy punishment though, a year off or something similar.

 

[mark_the_legend_foster]

Yes, it should definitely be a life time ban. If you tried to gouge someone's eyes out on the streets, then they'd put you in jail for it. Just because you do it on a rugby field people seem to think it's part of the game. There's no other sport where a player will try to intentionally blind an opponent so I don't know why it goes on in rugby. The IRB are far too lenient on the offence; Schalk Burger only received an eight week ban and ten minutes in the sin bin for a blatant attack caught on camera against the lions. This doesn't just effect a player's rugby career but their entire life.

 

[Hob]

Actually, one was a stamping. As rugby now seems to be a no contact sport I don't know what one should do. In the days when rucking was allowed and there was a contest for the ball, fewer of these injuries happened. Curious non?

 

[Dan]

NO WAY! eye gouging is the worst thing that happens in the sport of rugby. however, i don't think think it should result in a lifetime ban. why end someones career when they may have simply over reacted? why ban younger players from ever playing the sport again for a mistake they made? i only think it should be a lifetime ban if a player continually does it. e.g. bakkies botha

 

[mark l]

If there were clear evidence that the gouging was intentional, then it seems to me a lifetime ban would be in order. It ought not to depend on the extent of the injury it caused: it should be evident to all persons past the age of reason that there is a high probability of grave injury in eye-gouging, regardless of the outcome. In many jurisdictions, intentional gouging could also be subject to legal sanction. Intentional gouging is far, far outside the range of risks to which we assent in playing rugby.

However, for a lifetime ban to be justified, there would have to be clear evidence (or an admission) that the act was intentional. It is very easy for incidental contact to the face to occur, even incidental contact that leads to grave injury. Before we brand someone for life as guilty of grievous bodily harm, the level of proof should be exceptionally high.

It certainly ought not take the blinding of a major international star to cause action. Not only because we do not wish major stars to be hurt, but because it is not the fame or skill that is the issue - it is the lifetime damage to another human being as a result off an intentional act. Could be a third-side prop for a pub-league team.

Mark L.

 

[norseman]

If it was deliberate, definitely a lifetime ban. Also a second offence should also be a lifetime ban.