England’s Henry Arundell free to play against Ireland after avoiding ban

The England wing Henry Arundell has escaped a ban for his red card against Scotland at the weekend after the disciplinary panel determined that his sending off was sufficient punishment.

Arundell is now available for selection against Ireland on Saturday but it remains to be seen if Borthwick will pick the Bath flyer after his disappointing outing at Murrayfield. It is understood the head coach was waiting on the outcome of the verdict to have “the full picture” before finalising his team selection.

Arundell was facing a ban after tournament organisers confirmed that his sending off for two yellow cards triggered the disciplinary process. His first yellow card was for not releasing when making a covering tackle on Rory Darge in the seventh minute of Scotland’s 31-20 victory, his second was for taking Kyle Steyn out in the air in the 37th minute.

He was shown a 20-minute red card, meaning England played for half an hour with 14 men against Scotland with Steve Borthwick saying afterwards that “unfortunately we gave them too much of a head start and gave ourselves too much to do and playing 30 minutes of that first 50 with 14 men hurt us”.

The disciplinary panel noted that Arundell accepted he had committed two acts of foul play, each of which merited yellow cards but also ruled that the first was a technical offence and that the second was “for a very different act of foul play”. The panel upheld the red card but ruled, “the sending off of the player had been a sufficient sanction, and no further sanction was appropriate. The player is now free to play.”

[Source: The Guardian]