Melbourne prop Jesse Bromwich will miss Thursday night’s blockbuster against Parramatta after becoming the first player suspended since the NRL’s crackdown on hip-drop tackles.
Bromwich on Tuesday night was suspended for one match after the judiciary panel ruled he made dangerous contact when he dropped onto Matt Ikuvalu’s ankle in a tackle.
The incident came just three weeks after the NRL sent out an edict to clubs to eradicate players dropping their hips and body weight onto the back of a ball carrier’s unprotected legs.
St George Illawarra prop Tyrrell Fuimaono also fell foul of the same crackdown, failing to downgrade his grade-two dangerous contact charge.
Following a hearing that finished after 11:30pm due to Kevin Proctor’s marathon biting case, Fuimaono was hit with a two-game ban.
Kiwis Test prop Bromwich was earlier left stunned by the decision, after an hour-long hearing and 15 minutes of deliberation between panel members Bob Lindner, Ben Creagh and Sean Garlick.
The Storm had felt so confident in their case that Bromwich could have avoided the ban with an early guilty plea, but he instead opted to fight it.
Bromwich insisted before the panel there was nothing wrong with the tackle and he’d merely just tried to slow Ikuvalu and make life easier for the other tacklers.
“I drop myself low to the ground so I can get his knees together with my arms,” he said.
Bromwich also maintained he did not deliberately leave the ground and that he could not have driven into the Roosters’ winger’s legs or else risk a cannonball.
But the panel sided with NRL counsel Peter McGrath’s claims that Bromwich had put an unacceptable risk of injury on Ikuvalu.
“He didn’t take the safe choice by wrapping both the arms around the legs and sliding down and bringing the legs together,” McGrath said.
“He bent and swivelled around and put the body weight into the ankle of Ikuvalu.”
The verdict means the Storm will be without captain Cameron Smith, Cameron Munster, Dale Finucane and Bromwich for the clash with the Eels.
© AAP
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