London Welsh could face points penalty ...buy shares in their law firm now!

http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/rugby-union/21595254

Apparently they have fielded an ineligible player in several Jeff games.
The prior cases saw Tigers and Sale docked one point for fielding a player in one game....this could have serious consequences for LWs relegation battle.

Expect their legal team to be all over this if it does decide their fate at the end of the season. Oh dear oh dear.

Exe lost 2 league points and were fined £5k from memory back in April 2011 for fielding an ineligible player (even tho he wasn't! Nadolo had two passports, his Fijian one, country of birth, and his Australian one, country of last domicile - the last was used to register his with the PRL which meant that he wasn't a Kolpak player)

Ironically Grenoble were docked 5 points for their bonus point win over London Welsh in the Amlin this season for fielding an ineligible player. If Welsh lose those sort of points for the matches they've fielded this ineligible player they will surely go down.

London Welsh RFC are to appear before an RFU Competitions Hearing charged with fielding an ineligible player in a number of Aviva Premiership matches this season. The matter was brought to the RFU's attention by London Welsh after the club conducted an internal investigation earlier this month.
The case relating to the registration of scrum half Tyson Keats will be heard on Tuesday, March 5 by a panel of Jeremy Summers (chairman), Premiership Rugby Chief Executive Mark McCafferty and Dr Julian Morris at the offices of Slater & Gordon, Chancery Lane, London WC2A 1HL.

The club's former Rugby Manager Mike Scott is the subject of a separate RFU Disciplinary Hearing relating to the registration of the same player and has been charged under RFU Rule 5.12 for 'conduct prejudicial to the interests of the Union or the Game'. That case will be heard at a later date.

The club would like to stress that no fault in this matter resides with the player.

London Welsh CEO Tony Copsey said: "This is obviously a serious matter which the club has not only brought to the attention of the RFU but is also working closely with the RFU to provide full cooperation whilst the case is being prepared and ultimately heard next week.

"Due to the sensitive nature and the impending hearing the club is unable to make any further comment at this time."

Could be a problem as Keats has started 11 premiership matches for LW this season. Of course by bringing it to the attention of the RFU they will be hoping for some clemency if found guilty. I wonder how much earlier this month they discovered the problem - as Keats appeared against Exeter at the weekend.

LondonTiger wrote:

London Welsh RFC are to appear before an RFU Competitions Hearing charged with fielding an ineligible player in a number of Aviva Premiership matches this season. The matter was brought to the RFU's attention by London Welsh after the club conducted an internal investigation earlier this month.
The case relating to the registration of scrum half Tyson Keats will be heard on Tuesday, March 5 by a panel of Jeremy Summers (chairman), Premiership Rugby Chief Executive Mark McCafferty and Dr Julian Morris at the offices of Slater & Gordon, Chancery Lane, London WC2A 1HL.

The club's former Rugby Manager Mike Scott is the subject of a separate RFU Disciplinary Hearing relating to the registration of the same player and has been charged under RFU Rule 5.12 for 'conduct prejudicial to the interests of the Union or the Game'. That case will be heard at a later date.

The club would like to stress that no fault in this matter resides with the player.

London Welsh CEO Tony Copsey said: "This is obviously a serious matter which the club has not only brought to the attention of the RFU but is also working closely with the RFU to provide full cooperation whilst the case is being prepared and ultimately heard next week.

"Due to the sensitive nature and the impending hearing the club is unable to make any further comment at this time."

Could be a problem as Keats has started 11 premiership matches for LW this season. Of course by bringing it to the attention of the RFU they will be hoping for some clemency if found guilty. I wonder how much earlier this month they discovered the problem - as Keats appeared against Exeter at the weekend.

without taking in to account any mitigating factors, it's a 3 - 5 point per game deduction. i honestly think it could be a point per game.

Sale will be watching this very closely....personally i hope nothing comes of it as London welsh deserve to stay up or go down based on the blood and sweat of the players, not some behind the scenes paper work balls up.

sirtidychris wrote:Sale will be watching this very closely....personally i hope nothing comes of it as London welsh deserve to stay up or go down based on the blood and sweat of the players, not some behind the scenes paper work balls up.

every other team has to abide by the same rules, no reason welsh shouldnt be any different.

Bye bye Welsh.

Can't see them staying up now not with this news and their run in.

It was a brave effort and they made many friends although not at the RFU!

VictorU3 wrote:Bye bye Welsh.

Can't see them staying up now not with this news and their run in.

It was a brave effort and they made many friends although not at the RFU!

Very true, but at least they gave us the pleasure of proving the now departed poster HERSH wrong, who was adamant that they wouldn't win a game

HongKongCherry wrote:

Very true, but at least they gave us the pleasure of proving the now departed poster HERSH wrong, who was adamant that they wouldn't win a game

Do you think it was their win over Bath that tipped him over the edge?

They could still stay up, they just need a bit of like and for the RFU to not dock them.

Well, Welsh pissoff the RFU and PRL and are now being adjudicated by them? Not for nothing, but I would havve better luck having sex with Queen Mum's corpse than Welsh receiving clemency from these guys.

nathan wrote:

LondonTiger wrote:

London Welsh RFC are to appear before an RFU Competitions Hearing charged with fielding an ineligible player in a number of Aviva Premiership matches this season. The matter was brought to the RFU's attention by London Welsh after the club conducted an internal investigation earlier this month.
The case relating to the registration of scrum half Tyson Keats will be heard on Tuesday, March 5 by a panel of Jeremy Summers (chairman), Premiership Rugby Chief Executive Mark McCafferty and Dr Julian Morris at the offices of Slater & Gordon, Chancery Lane, London WC2A 1HL.

The club's former Rugby Manager Mike Scott is the subject of a separate RFU Disciplinary Hearing relating to the registration of the same player and has been charged under RFU Rule 5.12 for 'conduct prejudicial to the interests of the Union or the Game'. That case will be heard at a later date.

The club would like to stress that no fault in this matter resides with the player.

London Welsh CEO Tony Copsey said: "This is obviously a serious matter which the club has not only brought to the attention of the RFU but is also working closely with the RFU to provide full cooperation whilst the case is being prepared and ultimately heard next week.

"Due to the sensitive nature and the impending hearing the club is unable to make any further comment at this time."

Could be a problem as Keats has started 11 premiership matches for LW this season. Of course by bringing it to the attention of the RFU they will be hoping for some clemency if found guilty. I wonder how much earlier this month they discovered the problem - as Keats appeared against Exeter at the weekend.

without taking in to account any mitigating factors, it's a 3 - 5 point per game deduction. i honestly think it could be a point per game.

Well that's not what happened to Exe just two seasons back? 3 games with an ineligible player => 2 league points deducted. Have they changed the PRL rules on this one?

I have no idea of the rules but surely if this has been an error which has just come to light it could be treated as one infringement rather than 11?

The charge relating to Mr Scott suggests that perhaps it had come to light, MrsP, and may have been covered up?

Are the club suggesting that Mr Scott was working alone?

Looking at the rules :
http://www.rfu.com/thegame/~/media/files/thegame/regulations/rfu%20regulation%2013%20appendix%202%20%281213%29.ashx

It seems the penalty is a points deduction of "not less than 5 points". I suspect that this will be treated as a single infringement, but perhaps more serious than the minimum penalty.

LondonTiger wrote:Looking at the rules :
http://www.rfu.com/thegame/~/media/files/thegame/regulations/rfu%20regulation%2013%20appendix%202%20%281213%29.ashx

It seems the penalty is a points deduction of "not less than 5 points". I suspect that this will be treated as a single infringement, but perhaps more serious than the minimum penalty.

LT, that is curious when Exe were only given a 2 point deduction?

Asbo,

Was Ex's infringement discovered during or after the end of the season?

MrsP wrote:Asbo,

Was Ex's infringement discovered during or after the end of the season?

During, MrsP, altho we were safe from the drop from memory - April-ish

And, what is ECC?

Looks like the PRL big wigs will oust the team they have never wanted from day one.
Shame really.

Given that it's unlikely they will get away without penalty is it equally unlikely they won't scream persecution/victimisation?

AsLongAsBut100ofUs wrote:

LondonTiger wrote:Looking at the rules :
http://www.rfu.com/thegame/~/media/files/thegame/regulations/rfu%20regulation%2013%20appendix%202%20%281213%29.ashx

It seems the penalty is a points deduction of "not less than 5 points". I suspect that this will be treated as a single infringement, but perhaps more serious than the minimum penalty.

LT, that is curious when Exe were only given a 2 point deduction?

I believe Exe's infringement was more of a paperwork error than one of player ineligibility so maybe that explains it?

Heaf wrote:

AsLongAsBut100ofUs wrote:

LondonTiger wrote:Looking at the rules :
http://www.rfu.com/thegame/~/media/files/thegame/regulations/rfu%20regulation%2013%20appendix%202%20%281213%29.ashx

It seems the penalty is a points deduction of "not less than 5 points". I suspect that this will be treated as a single infringement, but perhaps more serious than the minimum penalty.

LT, that is curious when Exe were only given a 2 point deduction?

I believe Exe's infringement was more of a paperwork error than one of player ineligibility so maybe that explains it?

True that, Heaf, Nadolo would have been fine if he'd used his Fijian passport (born there and had represented them) rather than his Australian one - you could well be right

MrsP wrote:And, what is ECC?

European Coal Community?

I was just wondering if those regulations were specifically for the Championship rather than the Premiership?

I'd be surprised if any consequence of the matter makes a difference in terms of their relegation, their current form compared to the other sides at the bottom and the difficulty of their remaining fixtures compared to the ones that they got points from at the beginning of the season strongly signalled they weren't going to stay up anyway.

Asbo, Exeter were done for having too many foreign players, not ineligible players. They were also given mitigation for the fact that the extra one remained on the bench.

The rules apply through all the leagues. Several teams in lower leagues have been docked points this season, but they do not expect a top side to mess up liek this. It appears that the forms may have been adjusted to ensure that Keats could play as a Kolpak and not count as foreign.

Interestingly, this little ditty was on the LW unoffy site:

The RFU are investigating allegations that a number of Premiership clubs have been fielding ineligible players throughout the 2012/13 season. In a bid to clamp down on their strict salary capping criteria they have a announced they will be reviewing club finances over the next two weeks and will be clarifying that where salary cap levels have been broken, those players will be deemed to be ineligible for all club competitions.

Could more than just LW be in trouble here?

LondonTiger wrote:Asbo, Exeter were done for having too many foreign players, not ineligible players. They were also given mitigation for the fact that the extra one remained on the bench.

The rules apply through all the leagues. Several teams in lower leagues have been docked points this season, but they do not expect a top side to mess up liek this. It appears that the forms may have been adjusted to ensure that Keats could play as a Kolpak and not count as foreign.

Yep, thanks, LT

PS hope little one is still on the mend

An unsurprising development for a club setup that has previously demonstrated that it doesn't think the rules of the competition it has already entered into should apply to it.

Asbo,
It would be interesting to see if some clubs really are violating the salary cap, would it not? Not sure if the report is true or not, but would be interesting none the less.

If Welsh get docked, I wonder if they would challenge legally as they did after the end of last season. Especially if it puts them closer to relegation.

Unless they receive some sort of catastrophic penalty, the season is not over. They would still need to play and win, as do Sale and London Irish.

Dr G, it certainly would

sirtidychris wrote:Sale will be watching this very closely....personally i hope nothing comes of it as London welsh deserve to stay up or go down based on the blood and sweat of the players, not some behind the scenes paper work balls up.

Why not? That's how they engineered their promotion in the first place.

You wuold have to assume at least a point per game - so 11 points minimum - the most recent top level case was London Scottish who were deducted 3 points for fielding an unregistered player in one game so it could be up to 33! There will probably be some mitigation for cooperation but it will hit them hard.
They could contest this in the civil courts but unlike the ground ownership one I think the courts would be minded that as there is precedent for points deduction as a punishment then this is an issue for the sports body rather than the law, also if they did fight it and stay up I'd expect some sort of counter legal challenge by Sale or London Irish if they go down instead of LW.

This season:

London Scottish docked 3pts in Championship (tier 2)
Macclesfield docked 5pts in National 1 (Tier 3)
Dings Crusaders in Nat1S and Westoe in Nat2N both docked 5pts (Tier 4)
Staines docked 5pts in Nat3 London & SE (Tier 5)


Not all are for ineligible players, and I am not sure if any were for the same player appearing more than once. Also no idea why Scottish got only a 3pt deduction.

EDIT
On investigation, Staines failed to fulfill a fixture. The others fielded an ineligible player for 1 match.

Looking at the registration rules it seems that the RFU (and in LW case PRL) hold the registration papers and check after each match. That this was not picked up suggests that registration paperwork was filed but filled in incorrectly. The charge raised against Mike Scott suggests that their is suspicion this was done deliberately.

Still leaves us in a massive mess - especially as has been suggested earlier that other clubs are under investigation.

LondonTiger wrote:

HongKongCherry wrote:

Very true, but at least they gave us the pleasure of proving the now departed poster HERSH wrong, who was adamant that they wouldn't win a game

Do you think it was their win over Bath that tipped him over the edge?

You could be right. There was an audible scream, rather like that of a fat lady, when Donald threw that pass. I fear HERSH may have been sectioned, which would certainly explain his absence

It would be a real shame if LW's stay in the premiership was decided by anything other than on-field matters. I can't help but think the old boys are likely to hold a grudge against them.


More interesting for me would be the results of an investigation into the breaking of the salary cap, I hope the results are made public.

I agree Bathman that it would be a shame - but at the same time this does not look like a minor accidental breach of rules. I actually think that if found guilty LW will get a hugely smaller deduction than the rules would allow. (Also note that the rules here are governed by RFU and not PRL)


As to Salary cap infringements I agree it will be interesting. I suspect that in years gone by Leicester exceeded the cap - but now are compliant. You just have to look at the ins-and-outs over the last few years to see that players on much higher salaries have been replaced by players on much lower as tigers try and manage a squad big enough to cope with international call-ups yet remain within the cap.

The comment about investigation into possible salary cap violations was posted on an unofficial website. So it might or might not be true. For me, I would like to see if some clubs have gone over, as many people suspect.

For Welsh, it is hard to know what penalty would be given. 11 matches seems to be almost unprecenented in recent years. And is very complicated because it impacts Welsh, but also potentially Sale, London Irish, and maybe Worcester, too.

DG ...there are investigations about the cap, the cap Tsar exists for that very purposes. its a bit of a canard in this case though, which is to do with incorrect or non existant player registrations.
The cap is a PRL rule and administered them, player registration is an RFU issue. the sanctions (and precedent) for the two cases are different as well (points deductions for player registration, sweeping it under the carpet and changing the cap rules for the latter).
There may be a threat to consider any players payed outside the cap (current accusation is that clubs are arranging commercial endorsements and other sources of income through third party agents and passing them off as outside interests for players... which would not fall under the cap (eg Castro can buy and run a restaurant, but not be given one by Tigers)) as illegal and invalidate their registration...but that would not be post dated, as at the time they played their registration was valid. If it has been happening it will be very hard to prove and doubtless end up in the courts if severe sanctions are imposed. The RFU would also have to consider the danger of losing players abroad again if clubs become scared of signing anyone with commercial interests (eg James Haskell who makes a lot from modelling) not to mention them being left with half the premiership clubs unable to field proper sides and stuck with lengthy contracts to pay players they arent allowed to use. I really suspect this is more of a "this is what we could do" sabre rattle rather than anything thats likely to happen en masse.

Proving a case that someone didnt file their paperwork would be a lot easier, especially when they have fessed up to it.
Best case scenario for the RFU is that LW car crash from here and get relegated of their own accord before a points penalty is imposed. If it puts them down, even if it follows precedent and is light, there will be a huge outcry again...and worst case an appeal. Or if the penalty imposed is light and doesnt put them down expect the same from whoever does end up bottom.

Messy, very messy

AsLongAsBut100ofUs wrote:

LondonTiger wrote:Looking at the rules :
http://www.rfu.com/thegame/~/media/files/thegame/regulations/rfu%20regulation%2013%20appendix%202%20%281213%29.ashx

It seems the penalty is a points deduction of "not less than 5 points". I suspect that this will be treated as a single infringement, but perhaps more serious than the minimum penalty.

LT, that is curious when Exe were only given a 2 point deduction?

Isn't it just like a citing though with mitigating facts, hence why they may get less than 5.

Exeter broke the overseas player rule on a technicality , thats a slightly different case to not registering a player...all the players were legally registered theyd just used the nationality for one who held two passports that meant he was considered foreign. There was also a mistake by the administrator in this case.

Blacketts comments on why they gave a low sanction:

"The panel accepted that there was no intention to gain advantage by selecting more than two foreign players in their matchday squad and that this was an internal administrative error involving a failure of the administrator to inform the playing side that the player was foreign.

"There is an increasing incidence of poor administration

With this case they will surely accept it wasnt a deliberate attempt, and that no advantage was gained by not registering the player correctly. The size of any deduction I guess will hinge on how relevant they consider the number of games he played. Id be amazed if they go over 5 though.

London Scottish is perhaps the closest recent example, they got 3 points deducted. Ill take odds on a 3-5 deduction and a nominal fine.

When I first read this I thought that this was a case of the RFU biting back following having their nose put seriously out of joint last year but obviously LW stuck their hand up.

Pending some more detail about what happened while I would feel very bad for LW if this caused their relegation if someone deliberately misled people then its deserved. Whether or not he acted alone.

The example of Exeter seems to be a fair example of a simple mistake that had it been done correctly would not have been a problem which means that LW are probably in the do do regardless of what and why it happened.

PSW, in the case of London Scottish it was for fielding a player in one game, whereas in this case it's eleven - for me the main interest is going to be how Welsh respond to the verdict, they may want to appeal which is fair enough but if they take it to the civil court again it will certainly ruffle the feathers at the RFU.

While Tyson Keats has started 11 times for LW in the AP, only 9 were "unregsitered".

The process usually is that the team sheets are handed to the ref before the game, and he will forward them on to the RFU who check for eligibility. Usually any breach is straightforward, picked up straight away and sorted out - thus it tends to be just one match.

Sometimes things are more complicated. Take Leicester in the 2006/7 season. Ian Humphreys was properly registered to Tigers, but subsequently loaned out to Leeds. Injuries saw him recalled to tigers and he played twice in November of 2006 as an unregistered player because Leeds had not filled in the paperwork to rescind the loan. This was only picked up on audit in March 2007 when Tigers were docked 1 point and fined £5k.

This gives us the precedent to suggest that although there were 9 matches affected by Keats ineligibility it could be treated as a sinngle incident. (Note the points deductions were increased after Sale's breach in 2009).

Now in the LW case we can only speculate till they have the hearing and release the results. That Keats has played throughout the season does indicate that he had registration papers filed with the RFU. It seems though that these were incorrectly filled in. Whether it is accidentla or deliberate they will, based on past precedent, if found guilty receive a points penalty. I agree with PSW that if this is the case then a single deduction of 5pts (possibly reduced to 3 for any mitigation) will be applied. If they are deemed to have deliberately falsified the registration forms - well that becomes serious.

Irish, I think the RFU will tread carefully on this as they will need for the outcome to be seen as fair because of the previous dispute. This will have to be a very finely balanced response. They are especially in a bind over this as it will set precedents and if there has been flounting of the rules they will not be able to let it go. Interesting times as the Chinese saying goes.

London Tiger,
That's a great summary. Thanks for that.
I agree with most people that it would be unfortunate if Welsh are relegated due to this infraction, if not done deliberately. If they go down, it should be due to actions on the field, not an error in the back room. If this was indeed deliberate, then they have no one to blame but themselves.

No sympathy from me. Good riddance to a club that spends more time in court than playing rugby.

Given that they were so keen to see the 'right thing' done when they were promoted I assume they'll take a large point deduction with good grace.

Their moral high horse is in the lasagne.