Jon Wilkin calls for eight-match ban after Warrington Wolves man’s ‘shocking’ tackle

Warrington Wolves could be set to lose Sam Powell to a long ban in the eyes of Jon Wilkin with the pundit heavily critical of the hooker’s tackle on Leigh’s Tesi Niu.

Leigh ran out as comfortable 24-6 winners over Warrington but the big issue for the Leopards was the knee injury sustained by Niu following Powell’s hip drop tackle, for which he was sin binned.

Warrington head coach Sam Burgess spoke post-match on Sky, suggesting that Wolves’ centre Arron Lindop was the victim of a similar tackle last week, with the offender Guillermo Aispuro-Bichet not sin-binned at the time.

Wilkin would then disagree, claiming that the two tackles were very different, as he suggested that Powell could and should be banned for eight matches given that Aispuro-Bichet had copped a two-match ban for his offence.

When asked, Burgess said: “I’m glad you brought up because the same tackle happened last week and no one went to the bin.

“Maybe that’s a question you’ve got to ask, why is it a different outcome today? The referee just had one of those days where it wasn’t going our way today.”

Reacting to that, Wilkin disagreed: “I’m sorry, I completely disagree with Sam Burgess. Aispuro-Bichet’s tackle, you could spot after several angles of watching it.

“When Sam Powell did that, I could not believe it wasn’t a red card. That’s an eight week ban, that’s a shocking tackle, that (could) break someone’s leg, that (could) end someone’s career.

“The Aispuro-Bichet tackle for me was much more accidental in the process of spinning around.”

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Warrington Wolves tackle slammed by Jon Wilkin

Speaking further on the Aispuro-Bichet tackle compared to the tackle by Powell, Wilkin admitted that last week’s one went unseen whereas the incident today was clear from the start.

“We missed it. We watched it five times so it was only when Sam mentioned it post-game that we had retrospective wisdom that the tackle might have been dodgy. We watched the game and we watched that tackle numerous times and we didn’t pick up, whereas I saw Sam Powell’s tackle today and I went ‘yuck, that’s rank’. That’s the difference for me.

“I respect Sam Burgess, he’s got a jury of care to his players but they’re not the same.”

Sam Tomkins agreed, admitting that Powell’s tackle was ‘clear’, adding: “It wasn’t clumsy, it was desperation from Sam Powell who was trying to hold on to Tesi Niu and he thinks the only way he can stop him is to fall to the ground, then he puts weight through the knee joint.”

Wilkin would clarify that the fact Niu may be sidelined for a while shouldn’t factor into the possible ban for Powell as he maintained that it was an ugly tackle and should be punished regardless of the injury outcome.

“I don’t necessarily think we should judge how bad those tackles are on the the relevance of the injury.

“Had he not injured him, that should have been a card and maybe a red card. Aispuro-Bichet got two match but it wasn’t detected during the game. We need to get rid of those tackles.”