Sharks star Wade Graham’s hit with four-week ban

Sharks star Wade Graham has been hit with a brutal ban, despite commentators and fans were baffled when he was sin binned.

Grahm will miss the next month of footy. Photo by Mark Kolbe/Getty Images

Sharks star Wade Graham has been banned for four games after he failed to have his charge downgraded to careless for his reckless tackle on Davvy Moale.

Graham has lost at the NRL judiciary and will now miss games against the Eels, Raiders, Dragons and Warriors. It marked the biggest suspension of Graham’s 278-game career, which began in 2008, and he now faces the prospect of falling short of the 300-game milestone. 

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Graham was looking to downgrade his reckless tackle charge for a high shot on Rabbitohs prop Davvy Moale. 

“Disappointed with the result, we thought we had a good argument moving it from reckless to careless but the panellist found otherwise,” he said.

“It’s disappointing at the start of the season that I’m going to miss a month of footy, unfortunately the result didn’t go our way but we’ve just got to get on with things now. ”If that’s the bar they’ve set moving forward for a reckless tackle it will be interesting to see how it plays out for the rest of the year.

“I’ve only been here twice, this is the second time in 16 years and both times haven’t been good. I did have a bad feeling from the start just with the directions that were given but it was really a test case between reckless and careless.” 

Grahm will miss the next month of footy. Photo by Mark Kolbe/Getty Images

The hearing opened with replays of eight angles of the tackle, Graham watched them all while quietly sipping his water. 

Graham was then questioned by judiciary counsel Patrick Knowles, and the Sharks veteran explained what was going through his head during the tackle.

“I just wanted to get off the line fast and put pressure on Cameron Murray,” Graham said.

“There was no time to think, it changed from one attacker to another in the space of a step, so I wasn’t really thinking. I just went into my normal tackle technique, aiming to hit the ball and make contact so it’s an effective tackle.

“It was a split-second decision. I could maybe have gone lower but there was no time to change. I’ve had a series of concussions so I don’t aim low anymore but there was no time anyway.”

But Knowles argued it wasn’t his normal tackling technique as both his feet were off the ground. 

Knowles argued Graham had his eyes open and knew there was a risk he could make contact high, but conceded it wasn’t intentional.

“You lined him up, looking at him and aiming - you say around the ball but the ball is very close to his neck,” Knowles said. “Contact to the head is a risk players carrying the ball shouldn’t have to face.

“It was reckless because he saw the contact coming and decided to go ahead regardless.

“Players have to be aware of their duty of care to the ball carrier because he was travelling at speed.

“Graham prepares for contact with his shoulder and lines him up. His eyes are for the player and he admits his aim is to hit the ball but he can see the ball is being grid high so he must have foreseen the possibility of high contact.”

Wade Graham’s tackle that eventually got him binned. Fox League.

The NRL further argued there were no mitigating circumstances as it was a one on one tackle, so nobody else influenced the outcome.

Graham’s lawyer Nick Ghabar acknowledged the tackle may have been careless but argued it fell well short of the NRL’s definition of reckless.

“For it to be reckless a player must see the danger and tackle anyway,” Ghabar said. “The test for reckless is that he could foresee contact with the head. Very different to careless.

“This idea that he was on an upward trajectory is just not there. His head stays at the same level.

“Both feet only came off the ground as contact is made. It wasn’t a low position to a high position in a reckless manner. There was also no reaction from players or officials. Play went on.

“There was no time to change his tackle, you cannot say it was reckless, maybe careless. But calling it reckless would be to break this tackle down using 20/20 hindsight with the luxury of time which this player didn’t have during the tackle.”

Originally published as Sharks star Wade Graham’s hit with four-week ban