By Dan Walsh and Robert Dillon
South Sydney will seek a please-explain from the NRL after Jack Wighton was issued a pivotal penalty and cited for an alleged hip-drop tackle in Saturday’s loss to North Queensland that did not warrant any subsequent sanction from the match-review committee.
The Rabbitohs will have Wighton on deck for Friday’s marquee Good Friday clash against Canterbury, but again face losing a starting playmaker after No.7 Bud Sullivan was issued a one-match ban for dangerous contact.
Souths were on Sunday considering challenging Sullivan’s grade-two charge at the judiciary for his part in a three-man tackle on Cowboys co-captain Tom Dearden, which initially did not seem to leave him suffering any ill-effects. Slow-motion replays later showed a hint of a back-slam.
If Sullivan is ruled out, $650,000 English recruit Lewis Dodd will come into the selection frame as Wayne Bennett confronts another halves headache.
Veteran Cody Walker began running on the weekend and is an outside chance of returning from a hamstring injury in front of an expected 60,000-plus crowd against the Bulldogs, while Jamie Humphreys is still several weeks away from a comeback.
South Sydney will raise the Wighton call with NRL officials on Monday and are miffed with the bunker’s intervention after Scott Drinkwater was brought down short of the try line.
What should have been a try-saving tackle as Souths led 10-6 became a penalty against the Rabbitohs with Wighton placed on report, though not sent to the sin bin.
Rabbitohs centre Jack Wighton.Credit: Getty Images
North Queensland scored a minute later – the first of three tries in nine minutes – but Wighton was not sanctioned at all by the MRC on Sunday morning.
“I think anybody who has ever been in rugby league will not agree that was a hip-drop tackle,” Bennett said after full-time.
“What was he supposed to do – touch him and let him run to the try line? Because that’s where he was heading.
“It was a tackle from behind, it was as simple as that. It was no more than that. It was a really good tackle.”
Cowboys coach Todd Payten agreed, saying: “I don’t know if it was a hip drop. If you’re tackling someone from behind, I don’t know where you’re supposed to land. You know that’s the part that doesn’t make sense to me.”
South Sydney’s gripes with the Wighton interpretation follow a hip-drop ruling against fullback Jye Gray against Cronulla that left Bennett perplexed.
“I’m not sure what a hip-drop is, to be honest with you,” he said last month, with Gray issued a $1000 fine by the MRC.
Bud Sullivan is the latest Rabbitohs half facing a stint on the sidelines.Credit: Getty Images
“I’m not saying that sarcastically. It’s a pretty confusing lot of rules around that. I’m not a real good judge of hip-drop tackles.”
Along with Sullivan, prop Sean Keppie is also facing a week on the sidelines after being charged with a grade-two careless high tackle on Drinkwater.
Sullivan’s prospective ban would leave Dodd as the last playmaker standing at Heffron Park after two separate suspensions scuppered his own NRL debut.
A pre-season high-tackle cost Dodd a chance of playing in round one, which Humphreys then seized with an impressive run of form.
A second crusher-tackle ban in NSW Cup ruled Dodd out of contention for the clash against North Queensland in Perth, where Latrell Mitchell partnered Sullivan in the halves.
Dodd, 23, was signed on a lucrative three-year deal before Bennett’s South Sydney return was finalised last season, though the veteran coach has spoken warmly of the English playmaker while he’s been biding his time in reserve grade.
Josh Schuster made his long-awaited return to rugby league at Gosford on Sunday, playing off the Rabbitohs bench in a NSW Cup loss to North Sydney.
Schuster has overcome a lingering calf issue to play his first senior game in a year, but is considered several weeks away from any potential NRL comeback.
Mitchell will remain at five-eighth against Canterbury unless Walker proves his fitness.
Meanwhile, Manly’s Haumole Olakau’atu and Parramatta’s Ryan Matterson are set to pay $1000 fines if they plead guilty to high-tackle and dangerous-contact offences respectively.
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