Bottom line is Flowers started it, it was all his fault, no excuses

'have to agree will all above . I have only seen part of the incident that has been shown in a national newspaper 'online'. You don't see a punch like the second one in U F C, it's no wonder he didn't come back on the field, bet he still does not know which planet he is on.
Is sine die too harsh for blatent thuggery?

I would give Hohia a 2 game ban reduced to 1 given he sat out the grand final. You cant elbow a player in the jaw and I thought flowers first punch was fair dues, the second one indefensible though.

I would give Flower anything between a 10-15 game ban although knowing the rugby league they will give him a time span ban of something like 4 months so it looks like they have banned him for a long time when the reality is that it is a nothing of a ban.

It was ten times worse than what Dane did, nothing in the first tackle Dane did and then had a stand up fight, yes out of order but he didnt punch a barley conscious, unable to defend himself, opponent in the head with a punch that realistically could have killed someone.

Spot on GFB. They'll ban him for about 15 weeks - from NOW until February, easy way out for the RFL

www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/rugbyl ... tions.html www.express.co.uk/sport/otherspo ... rand-Final

www.dailymail.co.uk/sport/rugbyl ... tions.html www.express.co.uk/sport/otherspo ... rand-Final

Charged with grade F (mustn't be a Z ). Missed game as at Eastleigh but my son
was watching it on youtube in car 15 minutes after it happened live so i knew it was bad.

Rugby Football League says Wigan's Ben Flower handed six-month ban for punching Lance Hohaia of St Helens in the Super League Grand Final

Three month of that is when they don't play, so 3 month it is then.

He is only going to miss 11 competitive games isn't he?

12 games all together with 2 pre season friendlies and 10 competitive. Due back in the game 14th April 2015. Wigan are not appealing and are going to stick by him. Saint's Chairman has said he must be supported in his rehabilitation by all concerned.

Then I think Dane was harshly treated.

Wasnt that far off then.

I think the RFL would have come out of it better by making him agree to go on an anger management course. I mean most people have had the red mist descend but most people can still keep themselves under control when it happens. Somebody who cant keep it under control like flower didnt usually have deeper rooted problems.

It's a joke, less than Worrincy and same pretty much as Manning.

gotta take into account it was a a wigan saints grand final, he'll have been off his head on adrenaline to point where he'd have knocked the queen out if she'd had come into contact with him. I think the fact that it has been shown in super slow motion a thosand times makes it look a lot worse than it actually was (although still pretty bad) in real time you can see he had already commited to giving the second punch and had no time to alter his decision making

Out of interest I was just looking at the forum for our Leigh friends. It saddened me to see a topic entitled "dirty pie scum". This was started by the one and only Dick Jones, a key member of LISA, Leigh Independent Supporters Club. Some of you may remember that she was the one who first broke the bombshell that Sam had a fractured skull after Danes tap.
How sad that some one like this who obviously does a lot of invaluable work for her own club can have such a vitriolic opinion of other clubs.
And thereby lies a big part of the problem. Before the game the comments coming out of both camps was more like two heavy weight boxers before a fight. Words like "war" and "hate", and now "Dirty Pie Scum" dragging our sport down to the level of football.
It's a game for goodness sake, surely we are rivals not enemies!

No disrespect but slow motion did not make it look worse than it was. It was a cowardly attack on someone defenceless, I could accept "being commited" to the second punch if the other bloke had remained standing, but, to follow him to the floor and punch him in possibly the most vulnerable part of his face is inexcusable.
If someone is so pumped up on "adrenaline" that they can't control that second punch or indeed "knock the Queen out" then they need help. As Gregg said an anger management course would be appropriate together with a more severe ban.
Andrew Gale Yorkshire Captain got a four match ban and ordered to attend anger management classes simply for telling a South Africa player to "go back to your own country"
The ECB accepted there was no racial intent but it was simply against ECB directives and improper.
Different games I know, but I know which governing body has more credibility.

And the Worrier got what for striking a bet?.
He must have hit that betting slip with some force.

Can't condone Flower as my previous post , sine die in my book.

I think the punishment was soft, but I think the RFL are weak, they probably decided that their decision would not provoke an appeal, with knowing their track record their decision would have been over turned. Just look at the debacle over the points deduction. Which incidentally what has happened since then.
Sine Die in my humble opinion would never stand up on appeal, and would be far too harsh.
Dane got a similar ban for an offence no where near as bad as "that punch" but we haven't got the weight of Wigan.

C' on H J, that second punch was either orders from above or a cowardly action. Maybe sine Die is harsh but in effect 3 months lets the whole of rugby know it is a tolerable offence if you are one of the 'chosen' few.

As I have said above I agree with you.

Anger management course ?

Hahahaha, they train rugby players to be aggressive from a young age, if you can't hack it, you ain't gonna make it it's as simple as that.
They train to get into the best physical shape they can be in, they give them supplements to enhance their stronger attributes, they give them psychological lectures to give them the edge, their speccies pump them up all week 'cos it's THE biggest game to them, they want blood.
Most of us whoever played RL would have dreamt of playing in a game like that, just imaginethat walk onto the pitch with everything going off around you & the noise & colours.
I can fully understand how Flowers reacted & as i watched the game in real time as it happened live at home on tv i was absolutely shocked at what i saw, so all of you that crave the "bring back the biff" type of slogan or attitude just think before saying it or be prepared for the consequences. I always thought it was an unwritten rule that props didn't belt half backs & if my memory serves me correctly, if that had happened on an amateur field things would have escalated fairly quickly and a lot differently to the victim's team mates pointing to the ref !!!!

Some of the nicest blokes who I played rugby with turned in to nasty people when on the pitch but to a man i can honestly say I never saw and would never imagine any of them doing someone on the floor like that. Without getting in to pyscho babble I would imagine if something kicked off in a town centre then a person like Flower would be in the centre of it because he lacks self control and it puts him in a position where he is probably a high percentage risk of getting in to trouble because of that problem.

No different to Halifax players then eh ? Broken jaw at a bbq, 12 match ban last season. Come on GFB's......

Cant comment on the BBQ incident because I wasnt there but I would rather one of our players did what Dane did than what Flower did every single day of the week. One is a cowardly act a defenseless person where as Danes was a nothing tackle and then stand up fight. There is a line when it comes to anger issues and Flower is way way over it, most people can control situations like that, the odd one or two cant.

It wasn't exactly a "nothing tackle" from Dane, he admitted himself that he was trying to make his presence felt. He deserved his ban for the shot on Sam, and made the following melee worse by running round the back of the referee for round 2 after things had supposedly calmed down......

.....that said, we and everyone else can argue whether or not 10 matches was fair or not, but IMO what Flower did was far, far worse. 6 months was probably right - but starting from the next competitive (Super League) fixture.