'Forced tackle': Why the NAS was freed from the Egan incident
Teammate Felise Kaufusi’s involvement and the fact that Nelson Asofa-Solomon’s right hand was under Wayde Egan’s left arm helped convince the Match Review Committee not to attack Storm’s brace in a tackle that broke the Warriors hooker’s tooth.
MRC manager Luke Patten revealed that the committee had considered whether Asofa-Solomona could be charged with crushing, impact of the head or dangerous contact and acquitted her of all three offences.
While some felt Melbourne supporters should have been sent to court to determine if he had done anything illegal after Egan left the pitch fearing he might break his jaw, Patten said the MRC felt there was not enough evidence to charge him.
NRL head of football Graham Annesley acknowledged there would be criticism of the MRC’s view that Asofa-Solomona’s forearm made “minimal contact” with Egan’s chin, but Patten said the committee had analyzed the tackle in detail before making a decision.
“First of all, we identified that there was an additional player, Kaufusi, who contributed to the tackling power, so [it was] two big men on top of a smaller man,” Patten said in a pre-recorded video shown at Annesley’s weekly media briefing.
“We identified that Nelson created space so that there is no crush and no force is applied to Egan’s neck here.
“There are a few other things we have to work on in this tackle, the first is the head slam. We saw that there was a clear separation of Nelson’s right arm as Egan’s player was thrown to the ground.
“Nelson has a good grip with his left arm but there is a clear separation, whereas with a head slam you will see the arm isolate the head and literally slam it into the ground. We cleaned him up because his arm was separated from Egan’s.”
Nelson Asofa-Solomona placed on report
Patten said the MRC had also considered allegations of dangerous contact but believed it was just a “hard tackle” and Egan’s head hit the ground.
Asofa-Solomona was helped by the fact that her right arm was placed on Egan’s chest, as her hand was under the Warriors slut’s left arm.
“As I mentioned earlier, Nelson has a grip with his left arm and there is a separation,” says Patten.
“In one corner, you can see that Nelson got the grip under Egan’s left arm under the arm there and we believe that Nelson’s right arm is diagonal from that grip so it’s diagonal across his chest.
“There was maybe a little contact at the end of the tackle with Nelson’s forearm, maybe with the neck or chin area, but it was just a small contact.
“It was a tough tackle which unfortunately resulted in Egan’s head hitting the ground but these are all things we considered when we decided this incident was actually the NFA. [no further action] for us.”
Egan underwent dental work to repair two cracked teeth on Monday but Annesley said the injury only counts after a player is found to have committed a foul.
The severity of the injury will be used to help determine the cost assessment.
Graham Annesley weekly football briefing – Round 20
“There are a variety of factors that the MRC considers,” said Annesley.
“They do a very forensic analysis and they take as long as it takes to reach a decision and they look at things in great detail because you are talking about a very serious incident when a player is charged.
“It has a financial impact on a player or it means a player misses a game, so that is an important thing they have to determine and they are asked to look at it in great detail.”
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