Gareth Hock of Wigan Warrior banned for rest of season - Rugby League News
Gareth Hock of Wigan Warriors has been handed a five-match ban, which will oust him from the remaining season for being found guilty for two offences during the Sunday night’s 12-39 defeat against the Warrington Wolves.
Hock is banned from four successive matches for carrying out a Grade E offence during the 80th minute of the Sunday’s game on Ben Harrison of Wolves for eye-gouging. He further received another ban of a single game suspension for punching Harrison,
during the same minute of the match.
Gouging in rugby league is categorised as a grade E offence that falls within the bracket of most serious offences in the rugby league if proved may lead to ban of four to eight games. This is left entirely on Rugby Football League (RFL) disciplinary board
to decide the count of suspended games against the offence.
In this case the disciplinary panel handed him the minimum punishment for committing grade E offence. However, when this was coupled with the punishment of punching, he had to face some serious consequences of being pushed out of the remainder season of
rugby league games.
Hock was also fined £300 along with the five-match suspension, which writes him off of the remainder rugby league Super League season. Wigans are only left with five games if they manage to reach to the Grand Final Showdown, at Old Trafford.
During the hearing of the RFL disciplinary committee, the Wigan’s coach Shaun Wane also accompanied Hock. While speaking about the incident during Sunday’s game he mentioned that it was "totally out of character for Gareth Hock" and the physical contact
was entirely unintentional.
Despite the explanation on Wigans’ part disciplinary committee did not reverse the ban neither Wigans are expected to appeal against it.
According to the explanation of the ban on the official website of RFL, it has been accepted by the disciplinary committee that, “the action was not a deliberate attempt to gouge the opponent's eyes". His actions were branded "reckless" with "the potential
to cause serious injury to the opponent".
With this five-game suspension, all hopes of booking a spot for himself in the Four Nation Series line-up have faded away. He will return to action for the 2012 season.
Hock’s records revealed that he had just returned from his two-year ban for proved guilty of cocaine usage after testing positive in drug test, which was carried out after the June 5 game against the Salford Reds.
Hock did not file an appeal against this ban and decided to return to on-field action on June 23, 2011.
The records of Hock are already murky, which means that he needs to be extra careful while he is on-field.
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