London Welsh brand appeal decision unfair

 
PA
Chris Jones26 March 2013

London Welsh today expressed their anger at losing an appeal against a five-point deduction that could consign them to relegation from the Aviva Premiership.

Welsh failed to get the penalty — which has left the club five points adrift at the bottom of the table — and a £15,000 fine overturned, having fielded Tyson Keats in 10 games when he was ineligible. They did, however, have a suspended five-point penalty dropped.

Former club official Mike Scott has been banned from all rugby after admitting supplying false information regarding Keats, including a forged passport, to the Rugby Union Football.

Exiles chief executive Tony Copsey believes today’s verdict is unfair as only Scott was at fault.

“We are hugely disappointed by the decision of the independent appeal panel to uphold the five-point deduction for this season,” said Copsey. “We are particularly disappointed for the players, who’ve given everything they can for the club, and ultimately they have been punished for something completely beyond their control.

“However, there are still four games remaining this season and the focus and efforts of the players, the coaching staff and everyone at London Welsh is now on those remaining matches.”

The RFU appeals panel accepted the club put forward a strong argument against the points cut but the breaches of regulation were too serious for the penalty to be dropped.

Under Premiership rules, the appeal decision is “final and binding”, however, the panel said: “We have decided to make no change to the financial penalty and therefore this appeal succeeds in part. In those circumstances we make no order as to costs.”

This is of little consolation to Welsh who said in a statement: “The club welcome the decision to remove the suspended five-point penalty imposed until the end of the 2013-14 season, and believe this action justifies our decision to appeal. We also believe this course of action was necessary to restore the good name of London Welsh, as once it became clear what had happened, the club made every effort to remedy the situation and did not, at any stage, deliberately attempt to deceive the RFU — a point acknowledged by the panel in their findings.

“The club maintain, however, that we have ultimately been punished for the completely unnecessary fraudulent actions of one individual, whose actions the panel accepted ‘could not have been predicted’.”

Panel chairman Gareth Rees QC said: “The circumstances of this case are quite exceptional. However, we have to mark this serious breach with a points deduction.”

Welsh are five points behind 11th‑placed Sale with only four League games left — away against Bath and London Irish, and at home to Northampton and Worcester.

Scrum-half Keats was eligible for an ancestry visa due to his grandfather being born in England but former team manager Scott made a mistake in the original application.

Scott submitted false documents to the RFU in a bid to pass Keats off as English-qualified. Scott accepted a police caution on February 14 for his actions in falsifying registration documents.

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