Hurricanes coach Chris Boyd slammed Chiefs centre Johnny Faauli’s no-arms hit on Wes Goosen in their Super Rugby clash in Hamilton on Friday.
Boyd was fuming after the match, which the Chiefs won 28-24, as Faauli’s challenge to Goosen’s head could result in the Hurricanes utility back missing next weekend’s quarter-final between the teams in Wellington.
“He’s failed two HIAs so he’s probably somewhere less than 50-50 for next week, which is disappointing for him,” Boyd told Stuff.
“Probably don’t need to say more about that.”
But, when asked to elaborate, Boyd did not hold back and described the foul as “a deliberate act”.
“I mean, I don’t like to see a red card in any game, but red is red, and you don’t get a more obvious red card than that,” he added.
“That was shoulder, no arms, straight to the head, with force, with intent. There’s no butting out of any of that.
“So that was a deliberate act. The Chiefs will be disappointed with that action, I’m assuming the player will be disappointed with that action. And at the end of the day, he got, in the end, what was necessary.”
Chiefs boss Colin Cooper also expressed his disappointment with the incident.
“It’s disappointing,” he said.
“He’s (Fa’auli) better than that. He looks to stamp his mark defensively, but he’s got to do it within the rules, he just can’t drift up, particularly towards the head.”
Faauli has been punished in the past for some illegal hits but has worked on improving his tackle technique and Cooper feels the 22-year-old had improved on it it until his latest indiscretion.
“That’s the first one he let go (for some time),” added Cooper.
“If you go back to the Reds, he did that to their big power number eight. When he gets it right he can do some damage. And I thought he contained their 12 (Ngani Laumape), we moved him in to help defend that area, and I felt where they exposed the Blues they didn’t get through there. So he has to take a lot credit for that, and Anton (Lienert-Brown).”