WHEN you look at the tables and results in Group 10 football across all grades this year the evenness and uncertainty of each of them is striking, but disciplinary issues threaten to overshadow all of that for the Group this week.
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The Wallerawang club is looking at sitting out the remainder of the Centennial Coal Cup after their match with CSU Blue was called off early on Saturday at Diggings Oval.
In a heated match there were numerous exchanges that resulted in Warriors players going to the sin bin, and it has since been alleged that one of their trainers tipped water over a referee’s head.
It continues a troubled season for the club that has already been forced to forfeit two games due to fighting mid-way through the competition.
To compound matters, the display of Blayney Bears captain-coach Terawhiti Cooper is also set to come under scrutiny following a baffling incident during his team’s loss to Panthers at Carrington Park on Sunday.
After being sin binned with his team on the cusp of a brilliant comeback, Cooper was half-way up the players’ race when he responded to a relatively minor jibe from the crowd.
An enraged Cooper stormed back out in front of the grandstand and delivered a spray for the ages.
Decisions on both issues are set to be announced by Friday according to Group 10 president Linore Zamparini.
“We will be talking to Wallerawang this week, they will have to front the management committee on Thursday,” he explained. “There is video footage, a referee’s report and a spectator report to go from. I’m not sure about a water boy tipping water on a referee but there was definitely a waterboy dismissed from the field at some stage.
“The reason the game was called off early was due to a lot of unrest, repeated infringements and there were a fair few players going to the sin bin so the referee thought it was in the best interests of everyone if the game was called off.
“They’ve been in trouble already this season and the conditions of them returning to the field were that there were no more misconduct charges after a couple of all-in brawls that saw them sat out for two weeks.”
With regards to the Cooper incident from Sunday, which spoiled what had been for 63 minutes a see-sawing battle that could have had a grandstand finish.
The captain-coach himself had been one of the most influential players on the field in keeping his team in the contest.
Instead Panthers, on the cusp of a finals berth in sixth, ran in six tries in next to no time to pull back two competition points and a lot of for-and-against on fifth-placed Orange CYMS.
“The Group are looking at that incident as well, Craig Stringer is in charge of the review panel and they will look at the video from that as well,” Zamparini said.
“By all accounts it was an ugly incident and certainly that sort of thing, a player involved in a verbal altercation with the crowd, can result in action being taken.
“Going back a while in Mudgee many years ago there was a problem and we set a precedent then. Jono Van Veen was suspended last season for a crowd-related issue and there’s no reason to think this will be treated differently.”