Risk of death or serious injury means Super League has to stamp this out says Phil Clarke

One of the biggest talking points of the Magic Weekend was of course the red card for Ben Reynolds after he was found guilty of punching David Fifita.

It wasn’t the biggest punch ever and it came after Leigh had targeted the prop according to Phil Clarke.

“I would guess that Leigh have targeted David Fifita before the game. When he got the ball, the urgency they went to tackle him says to me that they targeted him before the game.

“I don’t know if they picked him out saying they don’t want him to make a difference in this game.

“I don’t know if Ben Reynolds has got over excited and crossed that line.”

Brian Carney raised the question then about the game going soft:

“There will be some people who will look at that and say the game has gone soft but people will say there is no place in the game for punching.”

But Clarke assured that it was something that the game could not allow because one punch can lead to death:

“I think a bigger point that in society we know one punch can knock someone out, cause serious injury if not death and I think we have to make sure we’re not involved in a sport that is advocating violence.”