Belgium’s Alexandre Raynier attended a hearing before an independent Disciplinary Committee on 31 July, 2024, having been cited for an offence contrary to Law 9.13 (dangerous tackle) in their July international match against Brazil on 27 July, 2024.
The independent Disciplinary Committee was chaired by Marcello d’Orey (Portugal), joined by former international referees Donal Courtney (Ireland) and Valeriu Toma (Romania).
The player accepted that foul play had occurred but did not accept that the offence warranted a red card.
The Committee considered the player’s submissions, along with the clips and other available evidence and found that the citing was upheld.
The Committee considered the appropriate entry point for the offending and decided that the offence warranted the mandatory mid-end entry point for offending involving contact with the head of six matches. Having considered submissions as regards mitigation, the Committee applied 40 per cent mitigation to the sanction resulting in a sanction of four matches. An additional match may be removed from the sanction should the player complete the World Rugby Coaching Intervention for Sanction Mitigation (CISM) which applies to foul play involving Head Contact.
The sanction will apply to the player’s upcoming club matches once they are confirmed.
The player has 48 hours to appeal from receipt of the full written decision, which can be found here.
Visit World Rugby’s dedicated disciplinary process education and information page here, which includes a video on how rugby’s disciplinary process works.
