[patgadd]

Of course, as has been said here, good DORs will always defend their players. That's true of supporters as well, so I acknowledge the possibility of bias in what follows.

Twice in a week DORs have offered abysmal and ridiculous mitigation regarding their players. Pat Lam stated that Piutau acted in self defence when he punched Kitchener, despite the fact that Kitch was being restrained by two Bristol players at the time. He then claimed that Piutau had a good record, despite the fact that - er - he simply hasn't.

Perhaps even worse was Mark McCall's defence of Owen Farrell, citing his charitable work in mitigation. All I'll say is that the same mitigation was attempted in the trial of the Kray twins.

This rant isn't about thuggery, which will never disappear from rugby; it's about the way bosses react. Even the most loyal Bristol fan will grant that Alan Solomons, admittedly with the advantage of his background in law, acted in a calm manner and stuck to known facts when dissecting the incident. There have been too many cases of irrelevant mitigation and twisting of facts in defence of violence.

[Latecomer]

Farrell Jnr is in fact a serial 'shoulder to the side of the head' tackler, who gets away with these things far too often for my liking (very often to suit England's cause). How does that balance with his charitable good works ?

A quite ridiculous and outrageous (in equal measure) mitigating factor in my view.
If this is a valid argument then none of Solly's team of 'great blokes' should ever receive more than a cursory one match ban.

Anyway, a precedent has been set and all the fantastic work our guys do with Acorns, Homeless Rugby, Dementia Cafe etc etc will stand them in very good stead in any future RFU disciplinaries !!

[SimonG]

Sadly we live in a world where we have Presidents and Prime Ministers clearly lying through their teeth and manipulating the facts in the knowledge that their supporters will choose to believe them no matter what the evidence.

So I suppose it is no surprise that some DoRs choose to do the same and that some one-eyed supporters will choose to believe them.

Those with a modicum can only treat them with the contempt which they deserve.