Fans were in disbelief seeing this tackle by Bismarck du Plessis from the weekend.
Bismarck du Plessis was handed a red card for this dangerous WWE style tackle in the Bulls win over Munster at the weekend.
Munster traveled down to South Africa to replay their rescheduled URC fixtures which were disrupted due to Covid-19 last November. Munster, along with other Northern based URC teams such as Cardiff Rugby and Zebre were forced to return home with fixtures postponed last November due to high Covid transmission in the country at the time and outbreaks within the squads. Many Munster players and staff were forced to isolate for 10 days in South Africa before returning the day before their scheduled Champions Cup clash away to Wasps last December.
Munster safely made the trip down and played the first of their two South African away games last Saturday. First up was the Bulls, and this weekend they’ll take on the Lions. Munster were handed a 29-24 loss by the Bulls in Pretoria on Saturday. However a big talking point from the game came in the 70th minute when Bismack du Plessis was shown a red card by Welsh referee Ben Whitehouse.
While attempting to win possession back the ruck, Munster number 8 Alex Kendellen was pushing against the former Springbok hooker. Du Plessis, who only was brought onto the field 2 minutes earlier, picked Kendellen up at the ruck, and propelled him above his shoulder. Once du Plessis had Kendellen at the top of his shoulders, he dropped him carelessly down his back where Kendellen luckily landed on a Bulls player on the ground. Kendellen also luckily took most of the force on his shoulders rather than his head or neck, avoiding serious injury.
Du Plessis was rightfully shown a red card by the referee and will likely receive a suspension by the citing commissioner. Simply by the way Kendellen landed, Irish and Lions fans may see similarities from this ‘tackle’ to the one made at a ruck in the first test of the 2005 lions tour on Brian O’Driscoll by Kevin Mealamu and Tana Umaga. Although the du Plessis could have ended much worse for Kendellen, it didn’t seem as bad as the BOD spear tackle.
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